Enigmatic Carved Folk Art Bust cow vertabrae A curious little whimsey

A curious little whimsey

and make one (me) think it would be pretty fun to introduce some secret codes into daily life

held together with these gorgeous

who must at some point have been commemorated with their own deck of cards

Since finding an exquisitely bruised-looking old stone fruit peach

Enigmatic Carved Folk Art Bust cow vertabrae A curious little whimseyEvery time I look at this carving, I see it differently sometimes thinking it is a woman represented and sometimes a man; sometimes thinking African American and sometimes thinking it feels a bit Germanic or even Dutch. My best guess is it is a portrait of a black woman, and that the carving is American, but I don't know for sure. In any case, I really like how expressionistic it feels in addition to its elusiveness, which is amplified by the darkness