NAIVETE' OF ANTIQUE RUGS

After my last post someone asked if I thought those were supposed to be bird houses next to the much larger pot of flowers.  That wasn't the first time someone asked that question of yet another rug.  I explained that primitive folk art hooked rugs have a certain naivete' about them  where perspective of size and dimension doesn't enter into the creativity.

It is like the old saying, beauty is in the eye of the beholder.  Just like reading a book, looking at a piece of art, hearing music...each of us might perceive something different.  Take a look at some examples I've posted from my antique rug archives.

The dove and horse are huge in comparison to the house and don't think they weren't meant to be bird houses.

The early 20th century rug of two dogs appear to be more the size of horses compared to the man.  I noticed the man has a pipe in his mouth.

This is a well-known antique rug below, look at the size of the horses compared to the central house.

The cat is almost the size of the house and bigger than the tree.  Obviously the cat is the main focus of the hooker versus the house.  One might think the cat ruled the house😊.

Boyerstown Pups original antique is yet another example of naivete' and free of perspective.

Here you have a huge cat, smaller horse, two diamond shapes with doves.  

The early 19th century below called Folky Homestead on the auction site was the one which was questioned by someone before.  She said it was a birdhouse.  

Yet I see a yard, sidewalk, driveway and sky.  If you look closely, the sky and below indicates the red and white stripes of the American Flag.  There are flowers in the yard ~ but again, this is my view of the rug based on my knowledge of primitive naive folk art.

And a mid 20th century rug with animals larger in comparison to the house.

The rug below I saved in 2012 and not sure if those are giant flowers or supposed to be trees.  But again, it's folk art and wonderful.

My intention for this post is well-intended and to apprise you that the lack of artistic perspective in rugs makes them folk art.  Wish I could go back in time and draw a rug design from my childhood eyes.  And sometimes wish my gradual proper hooking techniques hadn't taken so much control.  It is difficult to pull off the higgly piggly style of hooking which was once how I started hooking.  Wish I had that hooked mitten I sadly traded to someone for their first project which I never received.

Finally broke down and turned on my heat since it is cool and raining now.  But only put the thermostat at 63 to take the chill of the humidity out.  Will put on a turtleneck and sweats.

Saundra