Curious Old Brass Wood Splitting Man Folk Art Match Holder (?) letter knife with terrific midnight blue hand-painted

with terrific midnight blue hand-painted strips and circles against bright white body

and actually a fruit--in order to make chewing betel

trained under Academic history painters Fernand Cormon and Jean Paul Laurens and exhibited at the salon of French artists

there is always a face looking at you

with some rust to the surface

Curious Old Brass Wood Splitting Man Folk Art Match Holder (?) letter knife with terrific midnight blue hand-paintedIt was suggested to me when I purchased this that it was a piece of trench art, and I think that it likely, with the canister made from a shell casing and the little chopping man cut from from some scrap. In any case, it's certainly it's own special folk art thing, and I really love this smiling but very focused looking fellow very intent on the task at hand, which looks to me to be splitting a piece of wood. Incised on both sides, and serving as a