gods of thrift, i salute you

Oh! What's that in the corner over there? A new print?

Why yes! Let's take a closer look shall we?

It appears to be men on horses. Some kind of stampede? No they are dressed too fancy. Perhaps they are on a hunt of some kind?

Yes. That's it - a hunt!

Zooming in even further reveals that some of the fancy-hunters have run into trouble... silly "fence-slappers".

I guess they are probably fox hunting? Or preparing to fox-hunt anyway... the top of the print says "Hunting Qualifications" so maybe they are just out for a ride sans the hounds.

The print also says it is "Drawn and Engraved by H. Alken". I looked him up and he died in 1851. I have no idea how old this print would be. The framing is certainly not that old.... it has some kind of tracking number so perhaps I could find out more information someday.

I suspect that it is a very nice reprint, complete with a fake embossed line. It is not signed or anything. I painted the wooden part of the frame black because I think it looks better than the brownish colour it was. I don't think this is valuable so I wasn't worried about "ruining" it... besides, it was just the frame anyway.

I'm pleased as punch that I found this at the thrift store. Firstly it is just a good-looking picture, well-drawn. But also it fits with all the other pictures of horses around here. More specifically, it looks great in what I call the "man corner" (I'll make a post about it someday but basically it's a corner of the livingroom that looks like some rich dude's den).

Henry Alken was a print-maker and illustrator, so I'm into discovering how he fits into the history of those fields. Apparently he often did things that mocked the aristocratic, leisure class - hence depicting these dofusses* hitting the fence.

I've recently developed a strange attraction to fox-hunting stuff - I cheer for the fox.

I found a swell little dish the same day. It too lives in the "man-corner" and is the perfect holding dish for the remote control. Remote Controls are also "man-ish". This one is for the stereo. We don't have a TV because it blew up a few years ago but that doesn't mean we don't watch TV... we just use an internet/laptop/stereo configuration. We definitely aren't above wasting our precious time watching TV.

* I think that is the first time I have written the word "dofuss" and it occurs to me that it can be broken down into "do" and "fuss" - which would be a perfectly apt description for a fancy-19th-century-aristocrat. One who does fuss too much. A do-fuss. Dofuss!