YCL Art

The King Cake 11"x14" mixed media on canvas

So during Mardi Gras time, people like to celebrate with a King Cake. The general tradition is to bring a King Cake to a party & share with everyone. Inside the King Cake is a small plastic baby (a total choking hazard, but nobody seems to care) and whoever finds the baby in their piece of cake is responsible for buying the next King Cake, hence keeping the party going.

I remember being in kindergarten and being slightly scared to find the baby, but slightly excited to find it, too. Not having much money, made me wonder how we would afford a King Cake for the entire class, but find it was like winning the lottery.

Beignets II 11"x14" mixed media on canvas

Then there were the beignets, which are basically French doughnuts sprinkled with 20lbs of powdered sugar. Cafe du Monde is the most popular place to get these wonderful delicacies and you always top it off with a café au lait (aka coffee with milk.) It’s really hard to eat the beignets without getting powdered sugar on your clothes, your hands, your face, or even your head.

NOLA

So with Mardi Gras right around the corner and the Saints on the way to the Super Bowl for the first time in their history, memories of my hometown have been looming over my head.

As a child I remember celebrating Mardi Gras: the parades, decorative floats, festive dancers, and soulful marching bands. I remember the anticipation as we stood on the side of the road waiting for a parade to start. I can still hear the sound of the distant bass drum from one of the marching bands, it was one of the first signs that the parade was almost there. I remember the Clydesdales as they marched by looking so majestic & noble, the queens & kings on the floats,  and the crowd yelling “HEY MISTER, THROW ME SOMETHING!!!”

I watched the pretty Dance Connection dancers with their purple & white outfits as they danced by, their white boots with tassels would make a scratching noise on the pavement as they passed. I thought I was going to be one of them when I grew up, but little did I know I couldn’t dance.

I can still smell the exhaust from the tractors that would pull the floats, the sounds of the doubloons as they hit the cement, and the pain of getting my hand stepped on as I fearlessly lunged to get one.

Even outside of Mardi Gras season, the city of New Orleans is a world of rich culture filled with vibrant art, unique music, mouth watering food, and happy people. I was so blessed to of spent the first part of my childhood in such a great city. I still go back often to recapture some of my childhood and to get more imagery and memories for future paintings

Oh, and one more thing: WHO DAT?!?!

I was the first American born in my family, everyone else was from Colombia. My mom was brought to this country with the promise of a better future, but was unfortunately let down. Not knowing any English and alone with 2 young girls, my mom found herself in survival mode. Luckily, she proved to be a strong, independent, creative, hard working woman. My mom figured out ways to make ends meet and she brought my sister and I to a place that many families in our same positions don’t ever see. I owe my life to her and the sacrifices made to give us a better life. This image depicts the time spent waiting for the bus, sometimes it was early in the morning on the way to one of my mom’s various jobs or sometimes it was late at night after a day of running around taking care of errands.

A friend recently brought to my attention how hip my mom is in these modern times of “going green.” Ever since I can remember my mom found ways to live off the land, this stems from her upbringing in a small town in Colombia. Growing up we had chickens that provided eggs and sometimes meat, various fruits or vegetable either home grown or picked from the over grown brush around town, and on various occasions we found ourselves fishing and crabbing along Lake Pontchartrain. My mom continues many of these practices today and it’s beautiful to see and to learn. My mom rocks

I Remember Being Covered in Bugs

As a child, I loved to learn and explore. One of my favorite things to do was go digging in the dirt, wading in the swamps, and climbing through the trees looking for bugs or anything creepy crawly. I especially liked doodle bugs (aka rollie pollies), caterpillars, grasshoppers, worms and butterflies. Fear of bugs was not an issue, though with age I’m not as ecstatic about having one of these creatures crawling on me without prior knowledge. All of

God’s creations have always fascinated me, especially how they work together to survive and the different mechanisms that evolved so these creatures could survive in their own elements (ie a grasshoppers amazing ability to hop super long distances in comparison to it’s size, a doodle bugs ability to roll into a tiny ball of protection, a caterpillars ability to consume unbelievable amounts of food just so it can turn into a beautiful butterfly.)

I still revel in this fascination to this day. I found a huge slug on the sidewalk a few months ago and was absolutely floored by it’s size (it could easily cover the entire palm of my hand) and gooeyness, i couldn’t help but stop to observe it and then proceed to poke it gently with a stick. It’s funny how now, I can’t imagine picking up a slug with my bare hands, but as a child I wouldn’t of missed out on the opportunity…