What a find

Wednesday morning Joel and I took a stroll round the charity warehouse in town, it is a freezing cold place, where you have to dodge buckets catching rainwater on the floor, but oh boy it is good. Really good. The kind of place where the cups you buy still have fresh tea stains in them, like the stuff in there has just rolled straight out of someones sideboard and onto their over burdened shelves. Exactly the kind of charity shopping I like, non of this over priced clobber, arranged in order of the colour spectrum, ornaments in locked cases displayed with print outs of their eBay potential propped next to them.  I want to pay low and work hard for my treasures, I'll take my chances in the Nana scrum!

This visit was no disappointment, tucked under a pile of rugs something brighter than bright caught my eye. I pulled out a circular tapestry wall hanging of what can only be described as pop/folk art style. Perfect for Joels room.

Signature woven into the tapestry

Reverse detail

It's stamped with the studio details and also signed and dated (23:5:67) by the artist, Luis Montiel. He took some finding but I now know his work was mainly from the 50's and 60's (although he was still producing tapestries in the early 90's) and he lived and worked his whole life in Venezuela. All his work featured bright orange and magenta (amongst others) and is described as 'Pop Art Venezuelan style'.
It was up on Joels bedroom wall the very next day and looks fab with his bright wallpaper and curtains. His 'tweet tweet' tapestry must have had quite a journey to end up at Oakbank 45 years after it was woven, I am so happy to have found it and know it will give us many years of pleasure.