Thrift Store Report Saturday May 27

This is a shell that some craftsman ground down on a wheel to look like a fish.  He glued a bit of shell for the fin, and I will glue something where the eye was, perhaps a bright blue glass bead or something.  So much work, and it was 50 cents.  Not usually my thing, but I respect the amount of trouble people put into the things they make.  It has a wall hanging attachment on the back, and I think it is very lovely.

Miniature hand carved Noh mask, 2 dollars.  At first I thought this was Tlingit or some such, but a stroll through the web and I changed my mind.  

Two sided Flip Wilson doll, marked Operation Bootstrap, 1970.  The small rip on the left shin is where I cut the tag off and touched the doll with the scissors.  Fuck.  The other side is, of course, 

Geraldine.  This has a pull cord record in it, that certainly used to shriek, "The Devil made me do it"!

I wouldn't even attempt to fix it.  I liked Flip as a kid and was sad when he died.  Last I heard from him he had just pulled some people out of a burning car or something.

Incredible tray made in Ireland by Puckane Community Crafts Ltd.  A sort of jig saw puzzle, this is probably more for hanging on a wall.    Marked 12 pounds.  I paid 2 bucks.  Flawless.  It is signed by Clarissie Leefy.

https://www.facebook.com/Puckane/

Nice.

This stunning piece is a single all mother of pearl shell, probably some kind of big clam, carved away and lined with copper foil and gold solder.  The amount of work that went into this is staggering.  Never mind grinding small holes in a shell to make a picture, just lining this with the foil must have really been labor intensive.  I use to make stained glass, I know this was hard to do.  These are two hunters and even their faces are ground into the shell.  On the bottom it says Ifugao, a province in the Philipines.  These are headhunters, or at least used to be, but I doubt you get that kind of thing out of your system just because the village has a radio and has to pay taxes.  The way Duterte is running things the Moros will be back in power, just you wait.    One of the hunters depicted has some kind of horned animal on his shoulder.  I paid two dollars for this.

A better view.  I suspect this was made like in Manila and was part of a set.  The workmanship is incomparable.  And I have just read that these people are known for their terraced gardens, and may not be headhunters at all but one of the six peoples in that landlocked mountain province, which means that this was not made there, presumably.

Seated fisherman, nice modeling and paint,  marked Nanco, 1987, out of Chelsea, Massachusetts.  Two dollars.  Two dollars seems to be a default price with some of these stores.  The little boy is very well modeled and painted, marked only Japan, c. 1958-70, judging from the tobacco smoke I had to wash off him.  I don't usually buy very small statuettes but at 80 cents, well, hey!  Welcome aboard, son.
Due to my habit of looking for symbolism everywhere except in the entrails of birds, and that is coming, one could interpret this picture as a sort of-

As I am, so you will be
Pick up the cross and follow me.

There is the future me on the left, the past me on the right, and the current me taking the long road to sunset.  I am sure I could cobble together something about the milk can but the test of intelligence is the refusal to belabor the obvious.
Maybe the milk can stands for life, and the cart,.. er...well, sometimes a cigar is just a cigar!