For a painting titled, The Old Oaken Bucket, there are surprisingly few buckets.

Zero to be exact. So what the hell Grandma Moses? Why was she so intent on playing these mind games with us? There is a simple answer. The old oaken bucket is in the well getting water for the fine people of God-knows-where.

The painting was inspired by a song called, you guessed it, “Old Oaken Bucket” about a man and woman who fall in love next to a well. The woman never takes the man home however and he soon finds out that she’s actually married. Then her husband tries to shoot the man leaving six bullet holes in the old oaken bucket. Legend has it that Grandma Moses worked on the farm where the well that inspired the song was dug, but that’s probably a lie.

This painting was kind of a hit and many people requested her to make more copies. Grandma Moses did make more copies, but all of them are slightly different from one another. This painting and Grandma Moses’s work in general was so popular because it came at a time when people were really stoked to be ‘Muricans. Right after America’s victory in WWII, there was still some hesitation in accepting the European-originated Modern art. So, Grandma Moses gave the people a true-as-it-gets account of what being American looks like. This resulted in a lot of great press attention. A writer for the New York Daily Mirror explained that Moses was “more than a great American artist. She’s a great American housewife.” Classic 1940’s am I right?