Hunter Mann, the man with the van.

In the tradition of nearly inexplicable crossroads-of-the-world things that occasionally happen here in New Harmony...last week my friend Caroline called and said “Hey, there’s this guy with this great art car downtown, I think he’s leaving in five minutes, you’ve got to come now!”

People were gathering like ants at a picnic to gape at Hunter’s amazing van, an item inherited from his Godfather, who had riveted brass objects of every description to it for 22 years. I think he told me it weighed in at around 10 thousand pounds! People kept coming, and kept staying. He wasn’t able to leave as quickly as hoped and ended up staying the night in town. From what I gathered, he’d been in Baltimore and other points east for a variety of events and was heading back west, going to do an NPR interview in St Louis the next day, and just stopped in N.H. after pulling over at the Harmonie State Park for a swim.

I mentioned Wild Wheels, an art car documentary I’d always liked, and it turns out that he had actually worked on the film, with Les Blank’s son Harrod (an early proponent/promoter of the art car). And they have a new one out called Automorphosis, that’s on the film festival circuit right now.

Hunter lives out somewhere near the convergence of New Mexico, Arizona, and México, where they seem to have lots of film stuff going on, and also sounded like there is an Art Car Museum in the works out there. Some pictures below. The van is something that you could look over for hours and not really discover everything....but I gave it a shot. A small good thing.

Garlic!

Harvested our garlic crop yesterday. Pretty involved...plant in the fall...mulch...overwinters...water...water...water...then you wait til it's about half dead-looking before digging it up...then it has to hang for 2-3 weeks to cure. There are two varieties, a hardneck rocambole called Music Pink, which had a amazing 2-3 foot bloom, but was harder to dig up...and a softneck artichoke called Inchelium Red.

Then comes the enjoying!

Ollie, ollie, oxen free.

Met this guy Gary at our Heritage Week festivities here in New Harmony last year. Lives somewhere near the Kentucky-Tennessee line. Used to be a museum director and now does this thing where he takes his beautiful team of four 6-year-old oxen around to these historical festivals, to show people how it used to be. He does other things, but this is the one with which I’m most familiar.

The oxen are amazing creatures. Rare to be around animals of their sort these days, unless one lives on a farm. He’s very kind to them, never takes to the whip, always praises good work. We could all learn a variety of lessons...

Gary looks a tough customer—visually reminds me more than a little of Picasso—but he’s actually a lovely, gentle man. Quiet force of nature. Not unlike his charges.

I didn’t photograph him last year. Friends Bill Steber and Pat Casey Daley were here and we had a great time talking and hanging out with Gary and the team. Wasn’t going to let the opportunity slip by again when I found he was here this year (last weekend).

St. Looey.

We had a nice weekend trip to St. Louis recently. Got lots of good tips from a friend who just moved to NH from St. Louis a few months ago. Good bookstores, great meals, vintage records, wonderful architecture, the Missouri Botanical Gardens, oh, and that Arch thingy...

Like Brooklyn and Terry Molloy in On the Waterfront, St. Louis “coulda been a contender”—still a lot of fabulous energy to the place. Can only imagine what it was like in its heyday.

The nicest weather day, we mostly spent toodling around the botanical gardens. I didn't want to schlep my camera around, so these were taken with the trusty Olympus Stylus digital, little “Orangey.” Had just revisited some Dale Chihuly documentaries, so it was nice to have fresh eyes on three pieces of Dale’s work that the gardens purchased from a show he had there a few years back (pictured below).

Oh, and if you’re ever looking for a great but inexpensive place in StL., we stayed at a really great little weird mock-tudor 60s hotel called the Cheshire Lodge. On the southwest corner of Forest Park. Genuine (or at least well-intended) in a way that very few new hotels are. Themed without being “themey”—not exactly Ian Schrager.

Darth Tater.

Accessories for Mr. Potato Head are not what they were when I was a lad. But neither is Mr. Potato Head himself. Those bulbous modern shapes...pah! He’s come a long way from the time when he was an actual potato that you stuck ears and stuff into. This was sighted in my friend Holden’s room on our recent visit to Nashville.

Sai + Olive

Evansville Living, Pt. 1

A sweet young guy I just shot for Evansville Living. A painter named Clinton Bosler, who had work in the recent Mid-States Exhibition at the Evansville Museum. He’s been baking things and then painting them in his own sort of pop-art style (not to be confused with Pop-Tart style).