Santo (St. Joseph)

Art Historical Context

This 1939 watercolor rendering of a santo depicting St. Joseph was created by Carl O'Bergh for the Index of American Design, a New Deal-era Federal Art Project that documented America's folk and decorative arts. Employing artists during the Great Depression, the Index produced thousands of precise illustrations to preserve visual records of traditional objects, many of which were handmade and at risk of disappearing. Santos—devotional figures of saints—are a distinctive form of religious folk sculpture, and this work captures one such example of St. Joseph with careful attention to its form an...