Lollipop Butter Print

The earliest butter prints were whittled out at home, as implements to put an important, often the most important, cash producing product into marketable form. They also offered the opportunity for artisic expression.  The design often demonstrated pride in a good product and identified it within a community that knew the difference between good and poor butter.

They were then, and now, objects to be viewed as Folk Art where the print becomes a part of a larger pattern of folk life . . . in this case the production and use of butter in the home dairy.  Butter prints and molds were dairy tools with artistic expressions of greater or lesser originality.  In this example the carver certainly out-did himself showing his extrordinary design as well as carving skill.

Eagle motifs are comparatively rare on the early, hand-made prints and are more likely to be found on the later prints and molds of the craft-shop era.  Here we have a wonderful eagle surrounded by a vining border. The condition of the print is superb but there are several lines on the backside that need to be mentioned but do not affect the integrity of the piece. They aren't going anywhere, they are just there, attesting to its age and usage.   Made of Walnut it is 6-1/2" long while the diameter of the print itself is 2-1/2".
$1650.00
R09I283321

Questions?  Ask the Ferret!