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Monday, March 23, 2009

Vase Anatomy

Last week, while I was in JetLag Hell™, these two household items appeared, seemingly straight from an old episode of Wheel of Fortune, back when you were forced to spend your Winnings on items such as ceramic dogs and, well, hideous lamps and vases:

These items, along with their accompanying debris...

...seem pretty unremarkable at first--Especially this lamp...

...complete with its stained shade:

At what point do you stop using this lamp? It's base has been an eyesore since its inception in the Dynasty-era 80's, and I'm pretty sure that stain has been on the shade for a lot of years, so why are we just-now getting rid of it? I have to imagine it's because it recently stopped working and, like many other broken items we find at NeighborGoodies, the owners would rather deposit it onto the Big Blue Table "Just In Case" someone has a use for it. Which, of course, they never do.

Another seemingly useless piece of décor is this vase...

...with its, uhh, unique design:

I'm calling it a vase, but its breastacular lid, which is sealed on, actually makes storage of any stemmed piece of nature impossible. So, I suppose a more accurate description of it would be Oedipal Pottery, but that's not quite as catchy as "vase" or "eyesore."

I turned this item over to see if I could find any information on its Freudian origins and, as it turns out...
...this is a piece by Southern California pottery artist Tom Wallick from 1998. No matter where you click on his website, you are taken to a photo album of his work, where you can buy some of his pieces for 2-3 thousand dollars.

Two. To Three. Thousand.


Dollars.

Which means, basically, that someone who is Living in Luxury in these very Hollywood Hills threw out a BoobieVase that is quite possibly worth More Than TWO or THREE Thousand Dollars, clearly making this the Most Valuable NeighborGoodie Ever. (Even moreso than the $100 inflatable Charles Manson from a few weeks ago!)

Of course, by the time I did my research on this item, it was long gone. Luckily, I can buy more pieces at his web site...for two to three thousand dollars. And, thankfully, most of the items for sale don't even have anything to do with human anatomy.

Although some do:


Sold!



3 comments:

Ludovica said...

OMG Laughing so hard at that climactic final photo. Pity the Big Blue Table has a vase-ectomy before you could cash in on your top-notch Antiques Roadshow style research.. Pity.
There are people in your building with absolutely more money than sense. Fancy throwing away something worth so much, even if it did look like the final resting place of the mortal remains of some boob obsessed dull grey accountant.
I am surprised that it dates from 1998. I think it's rather retro.. surely it ought to come from 10 years earlier. Whatever. I wonder who took it from the Big Blue Table.. and I wonder what they got for it

Unknown said...

I'm gonna find out where you live and leave something for you to then write about. It'll be like life imitating art imitating life imitating art...

ps my word verification is "bentee"

Ludovica said...

Actually.. when you said sealed on.. is it sealed on or is there really no actual lid at all, because sealed on is creeping me out a bit.. perhaps that accountant is in there after all... EEK!