New painting

So I'm pretty damned proud of this one. This is 8" x 10" on black Claybord. Claybord is essentially a piece of masonite with a layer of white clay on top. Some are left white. I like the black ones...they spray a layer of black ink on top, and you have to scratch into it with a stylus. I used a stylus made for the Claybord and an Exacto.

(This painting is backed with a 2" deep block of basswood covered with gold-toned metal that is embossed by hand with assorted "calaveras" fighting the ravages of a catastrophic flood. Go here for a detail view of frame.)

I created a thumbnail "idea" sketch first in pencil. For my larger paintings I sometimes rearrange and tighten the sketch in Photoshop and then project it onto the surface and sketch it out. With this little one I just sketch it out directly onto the board with white chalk. Then the scratching begins.

For some strange reason...maybe it's my autistic/artistic temperment...I can work hunched over at a drafting table for hours, eyes straining, fingers cramping, just skritch-skritching away at tiny details. Stick a pair of headphones on me with my iPod and I'm in heaven. My ADD is temporarily alleviated!

Color was added with watered down acrylics, which I've never tried before and got real nervous about. But it looks effing A-OK if you ask me. After color is applied, you can scratch back into it to get more highlights out of the white clay.

To explain the imagery a bit, those of you familiar with Dia de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) or Mexican artist Jose Guadalupe Posada will understand it more readily then those who don't.

La Catrina, created by Posada, is a familiar icon in Day of the Dead festivities and an integral part of Mexican folk art. "The word "catrina" is the feminine form of the word "catrín", which means "dandy". The figure, depicted in an ornate hat fashionable at the time, is intended to show that the rich and fashionable, despite their pretensions to importance, are just as susceptible to death as anyone else."

Day of the Dead, despite its morbid imagery, is the act of "celebrating and honoring the lives of the deceased, and celebrating the continuation of life; the belief is not that death is the end, but rather the beginning of a new stage in life."

New Orleans, past and present, has great parallels with Day of the Dead and La Catrina. In many ways, New Orleans is like the grand dame La Catrina, an opulent and extravagent diva, full of life and richness but not without corruption, extreme hardship and poverty. Her colorful gowns and silks don't hide the skeleton, but we love her just the same.

Hurricane Katrina changed so much in New Orleans. I have been there before her and directly after her...and it saddens me to think it might not ever be the same. I've seen the streets of devastation, the war zones of bombed boats, cars, homes; the ever present water ring around the buildings and bridges. The striking thing was the void of people and the piles of belongings Katrina uprooted from their lives and threw to the ground. Piles everywhere. Baby clothing, jazz records, family photos, sports trophies, toilet seats, shoes, knick-knacks, furniture...just imagine a giant hand ripping the roof off your housea, lifting it upside down and shaking it out. Now imagine that hand doing that to hundreds and thousands of homes for miles and miles. Homes where no one lives anymore. Neighborhoods that are like ghost towns.

La Catrina is Katrina, a grand dame of death jealous of the grand dame of life that is New Orleans. In my new painting, she just changed the spelling of her name a bit and replaced her flowing gowns with flowing water. New Orleans is represented as a coffee skinned jazz-age beauty wearing a fleur di lis that Katrina covets.

In Day of the Dead celebrations, and Mardi Gras and countless New Orleans parades, and in the French Quarter and parts of NOLA today, we celebrate life in spite of destruction and death, be it death of people or a way of life. Death in the tarot represents "change". Change is hard, particularly in NOLA, where life is changed for not only its residents but for our country as a whole. Katrina was a thief and a killer and she brought so much sadness.

But music is still played by live jazz bands in the lovely old streets of New Orleans. Katrina didn't quite get her boney hands on that fleur di lis.

La Katrina left some friends in her wake. Mexicans are coming in droves to New Orleans, at least the last time I was there they were. They are coming in to work in the rebuilding efforts. It's a bit of a culture shock for the native New Orleanians who have stayed behind. I wonder if, many years from now, New Orleans will see taquerias, latin food carts and bodegas sprouting up, as the workers eventually settle down and raise families. It's just another parallel between La Catrina and Katrina.

This long and somewhat maudlin meander sums up the new painting. I hope you like it.