Kitsch Skier

Another neato thing I found recently was this kitschy asian skier, made of carved and painted wood, stretched cotton (for snow), and colorful stuffed fabric pieces of varying textile. It's about 6" tall, plus there's a lone nail sticking up in the back which makes me think that maybe something's missing from my newly acquired, vintage tourist knick-knack. He does look a bit sad holding his skis and hanging out under that sign waiting for some snow to fall (BTW: does anyone know what the sign says? Google Translate literally exploded when I attempted to figure it out myself!)



I guess I wasn't helping matters by photographing him on my deck with about a week of summer left here in 2019, so in an attempt to turn that frown upside down, I took a second photo of him against a white wall (to simulate a more wintery setting), and good lord, if he doesn't look even more miserably cute! Ahhh well, I tried. I'm assuming this is from the 60's or maybe 70's, or could be even earlier. I can't get enough of that adorable tiny lantern suspended above his head either!