eBaywatch: Nice Things at (Mostly) Decent Prices

No high art here, just a miscellany of lovely little things, such as I might actually have in my actual house (beneath the current avalanche of cross-shaped coffee tables and recliners and dangly lamps and kapok pillows).

Here’s another little gilt triptych, very much like the one which lives on my mantel. This isn’t a fine piece, particularly, but it’s probably old-ish (mine, I imagine, dates from some trip my great-grandmother took in the early part of the 20th century), and is pretty. Bidding ends August 12.

There are a number of examples of the School of Cuzco Painting (La Esquela Cusquena) floating about the eBaysphere at the moment. This one I believe is the work of a contemporary artist, but not having known much about this kind of painting before, I’m interested in the possible parallels between painters doing this kind of work, and the work of iconographers in the Eastern Church.

Here’s another.

Speaking of Russian icons . . . This isn’t a bargain item, but it’s beautiful.

Another wish-list-type non-bargain.

This on the other hand is a bargain, and would go nicely with that Bible stand Jody was saying yes to not long ago.

Here’s something: a 17th-century French Jesuit medal from the early New World fur trade.

Or how about a vintage holy-water bottle?

I’m always interested in estate lots of medals, rosaries, crucifixes, and so on. The odds are that a batch like this one won’t contain any real treasures, but this is a way to pick up, cheaply, a grab bag of the kinds of things I like to slip into people’s stockings at Christmas, into birthday presents, maybe even into Halloween bags, if I had enough medals for all our trick-or-treaters. Never too early to start thinking about these things. And as I believe I’ve said before, I can’t resist random stuff.

Another likely-looking grab bag.

A vintage nun doll

Here’s the hymnal I grew up with. I’ve turned into a Gregorian-chant kind of girl, but I still love to sing these old hymns.

More pretties for your wall.

More nice stocking-stuffers: vintage Little Golden Books. Okay, so it’s August and you don’t want to think about stockings, but I’m telling you, the time will get away from you. And anyway, this stuff’s for sale now.

I always think these are sort of remarkable.

The altar boy in my life would love these. No kidding. Now, if I could only find him a shirt with French cuffs to wear under the cassock and cotta . . .

One for my window.

The altar boy also has a pocket watch. Hmm. His birthday’s in November . . . you might have to beat me to this.

Finally, another one for the Sunday-night hymn sing.

Happy shopping, gentle reader. If you ever actually buy something, by the way, I for one would love to know about it.