Thursday, March 31, 2011

Stepmonster's Lamp


While going through some old digital pictures, I found this - a picture of my Stepmonster Shark's lamp.  What gets me about this "lamp" is that it is not a classic floor lamp. It is not a table lamp.  Like Stepmonster it is like some expiriment in creation, gone horribly wrong.

Shark's taste in furniture was unique, and her own.  I would argue that her taste was so beyond words that Liberace wouldn't dare go there.  When I would show people this back in 1995 when Daddy Cookie passed onto his reward, people were absolutly stunned. 

My late mother, God rest her soul, remarked "That woman's taste is all in her mouth."  Well, that sums it up.

Sixteen years later, I too am still stunned by it, as I am Shark because it truely tells you about the woman that she was and I assume still is.

Though the picture blocky from file compression, Reader, I can tell you that it was even more horrid in real life.

14 comments:

  1. The scary thing is that my Aunt had 2! very similar but smaller; matching table lamps. You can imagine how tasteful that was on her formica topped Early American endtables.

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  2. hard to tell.....is it more italian or hebrew?

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  3. I'm going to have to tear through the box of family pictures because somewhere I have the original picture and shark is on the far left. When it cleaer, you can see it better.

    What got me about it was that given its shear size, the base was awfully small for something that large.

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  4. Norma - It's Early Van Aken, the style adopted by East side Cleveland Jews back then. If it was guilded or faux gilded, they adopted it. What I recall about the finish is that it was hybrid piece - it was faux gold, then decoupaged with some coppery material, then it was antiqued. And when you topped it with the wrong shade as she did, it just elevates it to a whole new level.

    When she would turn it on and the curtains were opened the traffic slowed along South Woodland. It was for WASPS in Shaker, it was their version of the leg lamp: too God awful to be seen but like all accidents, hard to pass by.

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  5. Did it CAUSE any accidents from drivers rubber-necking as they passed the house?

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  6. p.s. I have NEVER seen anything like it.

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  7. Did you ever rub it t see if there was a genie inside? Cos, sure as hell something good has to come out of something so ugly.

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  8. It would look great decaying in my garden.

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  9. Sweetie, it's not just the lamp, it's the tout ensemble of the room. Gilt on everything, proportions out of MC Escher and purple shag. And what do you mean "the wrong shade?" It's all flawless.

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  10. In the mirror you can see reflection of Dad's original Peter Max painting, which was ruined by the artist himself when he scribbed "For Marv From MAX" on it.

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  11. The whole ensemble is like a bad Dali painting.

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  12. Bad Dali? That, my friend Dean was high Jewish style in Jewish Shaker Heights! The only thing missing are the cherubs.

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