Jacob & Son 1923 biscuit tin; described on the inside of the lid as suitable for being used as a 'floating toy' when empty. (although the inside of this particular example is too rusty to show this writing clearly.. I have shown an example in the last picture with this writing in (not included in the sale)). Does have some oxidation, in fact, a patina both hinting at and expounding upon its' 100 years and as if to emphasize by tangibly accentuating the artwork, the tin itself depicts an era lost to the fog of time ...., most of the charming detail is clear, with a girl carrying a doll and a boy holding a pond yacht on an idyllic house-boat with an open verandah on the upper tier for the 'adults', the balcony bedecked and emphasized with trailing Summer plants and spiky cordylines. Other members of the family are on their way to a picnic on the river, one teenager carries an oar, others a picnic, a nanny plays with a child...... It obviously needs the life-rings as there is no railing to stop anyone falling in.......Named 'Water - Witch'..... It would still float and could be used as a toy boat which can be pulled along and/or as a sand pail or indeed for other unspecified purposes privy only to the imagination and wonderment in the mind of a child.
         Indeed the true age of the tin is only revealed by the, perhaps surprising and completely contrastingly uniform matt brown oxidation of the internal void when one opens the lid, which upon first revelation is disappointing and in fact somewhat shocking, but upon contemplation, this brown void speaks volumes, exclaiming that this tin is from an age that has actually gone, as though the bubble created by the external idyllic imagery of the tin is burst by opening the lid.......suggesting instantaneously, going forward, that one should shut it promptly in order not to let the secret out, keeping it 'entre-nous'. Keeping the tangibility of 100 years locked away in this box for 100 more. What was once wonderment to the mind of a child, now wonderment to the mind of an adult.
................Having an eyelet at one end for attaching a string. Perhaps now a metaphor for the very tenuous string of time itself, a fragile but fascinating connection to the past.

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