Week VIII: Cuco Sanchez

I realized now after reading through my blog that I forgot to post my work for the week that I missed while in Mexico with my studio. The following is my response to Sanchez's songs and the themes that we have been learning about of soledad, caminos, and death....

The dashed line signifies the lonesome protagonists of so many of our songs walking a lonely road somewhat aimlessly. Where the line touches the pattern are moments close to death... or perhaps longing for one's love or home. The radial patterns represent the other side and are meant to imply layers of earth. Above the earth is a layer of balazos/bullets preparing  la cama de piedra and capped by headstones rising from the bullet field. 

The headstones also begin to suggest the stark landscape of the north of Mexico, where I have always imagined the revolutionaries to have spent considerable amounts of time. 

After listening to Sanchez's bittersweet songs of the revolution I felt I had to abstract the feelings conjured inside through a diagram/map rather than literal representations of headstones, sarapes, or guns. I hope this piece came close to conveying what the songs stirred up inside. 

El Ultimo Trago...I mean Semana

Arrieros somos 
Y en el camino andamos
y cada quien 
tendra su merecido...

Songs like Arrieros Somos, Adios Mi Chaparrita, El Desterrado, and so many others touch on la soledad that Don Octavio believes is ingrained in the very essence of the Mexican identity. Throughout the semester, as singers and styles have changed, this simple theme has endured as a running motif in many of the songs. The Cancionero de la Soledad is tremendous in Mexican song, and certainly gives weight to Don Octavio's words.

This week, I depicted a solitary arriero walking along a lonely camino. It's unclear if he is returning or leaving, but his long shadow cast against the green, blue, and yellow landscape is meant to evoke the colors, tone, and mood that I felt while listening to much of the music this semester.

Another theme that is hard for me to not think about is the notion of Old Mexico. As an anglo trying to understand Mexico's richness, I am often confronted by my preconceptions of Mexico as a place and culture before I entered the class. I won't lie; I had, and still have, a strong romantic connection to the place, but from an outsider's understanding of Old Mexico as culturally rich and quaint.

This week I watched Linda Ronstadt's "Canciones de mi Padre" and was confronted for the first time all semester by this external, Old Mexico point of view. In the video, Ronstadt constructs a fantastic image of Mexico as she sees it as an American from the southwest with family connections to Mexico.  It was interesting to see her portrayal of the people, their songs, and the place, and I have to admit that this is a story about Mexico that Mexican singers and Don Octavio are not telling.....

Great Old Footage

While trying to find original footage of los Hermanos Flores Magon I came across our current chapter from Don Octavio and some great old footage. The video accompanies a reading of the chapter with relevant paintings, photographs, and in the middle, VIDEOS! It was very helpful in better understanding the various characters in Mexico's history.

Viva Youtube!

Week XII: Cuatro Milpas y volvemos a tierra y corazon

"Maiz es el mejor amigo....pues... algien que esta siempre..."

Frijoles wrapping around corn stalks, bean blossoms budding, and walking through a sea of leaves is something that I often think fondly about from my time living in Mississippi. Cuatro Milpas triggered these memories, just as the sight of four small milpas triggered an emotional outpouring from the singer of the song....


In reading this week, listening to the rancheros about the campo, watching Valdemar's documentary, and letting everything stew in my head I became deeply nostalgic for my own connection to land and place. At the core of this collection of songs and ruminating on las milpas it is clear that each of these songs is emotionally connected to land, memories, love, and place.

El desterrado is a good example of one of these songs without explicit connection to el campo, yet the exiled/fugitive is deemed as such because he is specifically leaving a place (in this case a home land/lover whom he loves deeply). For some reason I am reminded of A la Orilla de un Palmar (and yes these are both written by Ponce....maybe there's a theme here...)

Solita paso la vida
a la orilla de un palmar
y solita voy y vengo 
como las olas, olas del mar.....

Both songs, and many others connect the subject to place in profound ways. El desterrado is forced to leave a meaningful place, while la huerfanita unable to leave her's....

This brings me to Cuatro Milpas and Barcelata's emotional intertwining of love, place, and campo.

Ya no hay amapolas ni hiedras ni aromas
todo se acabo...

Here, the cuatro milpas are symbols of what little remains and how much has been lost...todo se acabo....
Interestingly, this is one of the few songs where the singer is actually with his or her love. He is not lamenting the loss of a person's love; rather this is a song lamenting a loss of place...and ultimately, a loss of memory...

Y por eso estoy triste morena
por eso me pongo me pongo llorar
recordando las horas felices que juntos pasamos 
en aquel lugar...

In a way, I feel like this song should end the semester, bringing us full circle to week one and Tierra y Corazon. Regardless, all I could think about after listening to the music was my own tierra y corazon, especially after watching Valdemar's documentary link.

Gnu'u Nunui was quite moving, particularly a portion where farmers discussed their connection to Maiz and what it meant to them. Here are a few quotes that I think really connect Cuatro Milpas and the ability of land to connect to one's soul.

"Maiz es sagrado..."

"Maiz es el mejor amigo....pues... algien que esta siempre..."

"Es un alegria"

"Maiz tiene corazon, tiene alma, tiene cuerpo. El maiz siente, el maiz por nos da vida."

"Sin Maiz no somos nada..."

These last two feelings are quite evocative and remind me of Don Octavio's passage where he asks quien es? and his house maid answers "nadie, soy yo..." This understanding of identity is obviously very loaded as we discussed, but it is interesting to compare the anthropomorphizing of maiz and las milpas that maiz grows from as one farmer does...el maiz tiene corazon, tiene alma, tiene cuerpo. El maiz siente.... The land is a member of the community at times superior, and at times equal to each of the other community members. However, sin maiz no somos nada is telling. Here the connection to land and place transcends memory of one's life as Cuatro Milpas tells; rather, it speaks about hierarchies and social structures much like Don Octavio's anecdote...

But I digress. As I said, all of these thoughts rattling around in my head took me to my own memories of place and my own connection to the campo....in my case Magnolia, Mississippi.

What maiz is to Mexico, crawfish are to Southern Mississippi and Louisiana. I have so many fond memories of crawfish that trigger longing for my adopted Southern home...

Week XI: Sin Ti

"At three in the morning, the consolation of a Cuban song, floating by on a Chinese street in downtown Los Angeles...."

Like we discussed this evening, Ry Cooder has done a remarkable job of bringing us into the world that he writes so beautifully about. Perhaps the most striking thing for me is his ability to really capture the gritty essence of living and growing up in a city. Like a 35mm film noir that he obviously is influenced by, each scene has a grain, a grittiness, a texture that I seldom experience through prose. I strove to capture his closing words through a grain of my own. Three tiers of paper allow light to filter through each layer in my own interpretation of his vision of the city.

Film noirs conjure black and white images of smoke swirling around perfectly made up woman. And like Martin mentioned in his work, Los Angeles is best understood in motion. By looking at each of the layers of my work and the light flitting through it, I hoped to blend imagery and build up a textured work that paid homage to Cooder's story. The white paper is meant to be read in contrast to the dark shadows, and moving around the work produces different readings of it.




I also have to end with these lines. Isn't this what music is all about in a sense?

"He must have the knowledge, the repertoire of songs that tell the simple stories of life, la historia of every man and woman: romance, religion, and death. He must have the touch, the sense of the crowd, their mood. Happy and gay? The songs must correspond. Borracho and melancholy? Then, there is a desire for the songs of la lucha, the struggle of living."

Week X: Lara el Romantica

Mujer....tienes en el ritmo de tu ser, 

Todo el palpitar e una cancion.

Eres la razon de mi existir, mujer...

To the man who loved three things: music, woman, and Veracruz, this is my tribute. Listening to Lara's songs takes me into a dreamscape that only romantic, piano driven music can. Songs like Veracruz and Mujer have a lilt to them them that remind me of nostalgia tinged eyes looking out on a memory bathed in a gentle night rain. 

Granizos por el Jardin Centenario

Granizos golpiando por Coyoacan

Right after the hail cleared a version of La Feria de las Flores came ringing out from a shop and everyone huddled under overhangs strolled into the soaked plaza and continued on their merry ways.