Baby in Christening Dress with Elaborately Hidden Mother Antique TIntype dry measure sturdy shape

sturdy shape

I know that this dragon fragment from an incredibly intricate mixed metal overlay on an antique Asian table

found at an antiques show in New Hampshire last weekend

I believe the binding would also be used for hanging it

Baby in Christening Dress with Elaborately Hidden Mother Antique TIntype dry measure sturdy shapeI presume it is a mother hidden somewhere there under this wide and ambling drape of cloth an unusual expanse as far as I've seen. What I really like here is the play between that horizontal stretch of draping, almost like a landscape of dark cloth, and long, vertical drape of this child's white (christening?) gown, falling all the way to the ground. And then of course that baby's wide eyed face at the center of it all, looking simultaneously relaxed