You Know That's an Old Camel Saddle, Right?

There was a sign on the door. "Hussey. Top Floor."



A part of me didn't want to go up, didn't want there to be any confusion. But I did, and found local artist Tim Hussey's "yard sale."

Hussey won me over with his Shrimp Records t-shirt and guacamole. A Chinese Acupuncture statue and rantings in his mother's direction to "Not cross the tape line!" Oh, and his art was pretty cool, too.

But back to why I was there. A yard sale. Ayoka Lucas, style editor of Charleston Magazine, was hanging out in the kitchen. "You've got to get to yard sales early," she says, "I got all the best stuff." She took me in the other room to show off her loot. One score was even better than she thought: A friend pointed out that a wooden stool was actually made out of a camel saddle.



Hussey's yard sale was really more of a moving sale. "I'm downsizing," he says, "I'm an artist, and I'm going to start living like one."

Hussey is known as a painter and photographer in Charleston. Represented at the Rebekah Jacob Gallery downtown, Hussey's work is the product of layering and found objects. He's been described as "puzzling and astonishing."



Every table--which was probably for sale too--was piled with jumbled iron letters, ceramic birds, rusted fans. Another local artist, Nathan Durfee, talked Hussey out of a neon orange chair that wasn't originally for sale.







"I feel like this space was like a painting," Hussey says, "And out of context, I don't think this stuff would work, so I'm selling it."

We helped Hussey's cause and left. Then just had to fit the standing birdcage, picture frame, neon orange chair, local artist, and his bookbag into the backseat of a Camry.