Tucson Examiner: Are You Ready for Halloween?

Halloween is not just a day in Tucson, it's a season! Are you ready? Here are some costume tips for adults in my latest article in the Tucson Examiner.

Wandering Through Dreams: on Congress Street

Spirit's Journey, the latest exhibit at the Central Arts Gallery, will open this coming Saturday, February 7, 2009, with an artists' reception from 6-9 p.m.

Two of my pieces will be included in this show: Wandering Through Dreams (pictured here) and La Mano Mas Poderosa mosaic shrine. I'm proud to say that both of them are on display in the windows of the gallery. I'm also exhibiting jewelry and smaller clay pieces at the gallery for this show, which runs through March 28.

The Central Arts Gallery opening is just one of many scheduled for this Saturday downtown. Many galleries along Congress Street and 6th Street will be open this weekend as part of the Art Safari, organized by the Central Tucson Gallery Association. So, if you missed seeing Bound for Love at the opening of the Amores Perros erotic art show two weeks ago, you can catch it on Saturday at Raices Gallery.

Come downtown and support the arts in Tucson! Here is a list of participating galleries from the Tucson Citizen and a very thorough write-up in the Tucson Weekly.

All Souls Procession 2008

As usual, the All Souls Procession was an amazing event again this year. Although this post is dated November 29, 2008, I'm actually posting it on December 27, 2008-- due to multiple computer problems in recent weeks.

I had a real scare regarding my DOD pics. I prepared them for uploading a few days after the procession but didn't actually upload them to the blog or to Flickr and didn't back them up to my external drive. My bad. When my computer crash, I was really sweating it. Luckily, the motherboard was bad and not the hard drive. If it had been the hard drive, I would have lost my DOD photos and other recent images. Yikes!

I'm just uploading a few here. (Yes, that's me with my Roma look on the right.) Log onto my Flickr account to see Day of the Dead photos from 2007 and 2008. Cheers!

El Dia de los Muertos

One of the most unique holidays in Tucson is El Dia de los Muertos (Day of the Dead). Historically, November 1, the Day of the Dead, has been a day where primarily Hispanics honor loved ones who have passed on. They bring food, drinks, music, flowers, and momentos to local cemetaries and have parties or picnics graveside.

Several years ago, a band of local artists started the All Souls Procession in Tucson to honor the dead. What was once a small rag-tag procession around downtown has turned into two weeks of events, with a huge procession as the finale. The link here goes to the main website and calendar for this year's events. The procession itself is November 9, 2008.

Last year, I walked in the procession (in costume, at right) and took tons of pictures with my Nikon Cool Pix. That camera has a "party" setting which allows for two flashes within one long time exposure. I used this setting for most of my procession pictures. At top is "Danny Boy, the Pipes Are Calling"; this photo will be hanging in the Go Boldly Exhibit at Central Arts Gallery in November. There are some here and more on my Flickr site. I'm looking forward to seeing how my new Nikon digital SLR does at the procession this year.

On the weekend, my daughter and I shopped around on 4th Avenue for costume accessories for this year's procession. I bought a red petticoat and long red satin elbow-length gloves. What fun! Stay tuned for 2008 DOD pictures.