Hooked

 Here is something I picked up recently. Not super valuable but lovely.

This is an American hooked rug from the 19th century.

Out here in California we do not see a lot of early American folk art. So I was happy when the couple from Redlands called me with this hooked rug, dated 1888. I assume that it is from the Ohio or Pennsylvania area but I have also seen a lot of them that were made in Maryland of all places.

What makes this piece noteworthy and I am in no way an expert is the sheer number of pictorial elements. I have a rough count of sixty. 

I didn't think I saw a cat but now I see what might have been a cat, between the boot and the hookah bottom right.

In any case, this is the most crazy quiltish, densely populated hooked rug I have ever seen, by a long shot and I dig that.

I think it will probably find a nice new home in October when I go back to Texas.

People don't do Americana or folk art on the West Coast anymore, not Jetsony enough, it doesn't go well with plastic boomerang tables and you can't find it at Ikea. God forbid we try to warm up our spaces.