La Corua Digital Art
  • Home
    • Roots
  • Traditions
  • Barrios
    • Gardens
  • People
    • Music
  • Folklore
  • Border
    • En Memoriam
  • Graphics
    • THCC
  • Codex
CODEX

Navidad MPP 2019

12/16/2019

 
Navidad en Arizona
Arizona has been called "America's Meth Lab of Democracy".  Many hot button issues were tried here first and have since gone national-- on steroids. One of them is nativism. Back in 2013, I did a painting called, Navidad Baja Arizona - A Christmas Story.  It was my response to the dehumanization of immigrants dying in our desert, and how women were accused of coming here to have "anchor babies" and game our system. 

Fear and victim-blaming has been a wildly successful political weapon throughout history, especially in Arizona--and each generation to breeds new sets of eager, vulnerable ears. Enter the Trump brand of nativism and by 2019, it's a whole new ballgame. This Christmas, I didn't need to reinvent the wheel-- just add some ammunition and realities we'd rather not think about. I DO want to remember that the Nativity is really about the Human Spirit. Regimes come and go and although the human spirit is ephemeral, it finds a way. Always.

- Linda Magdalena Victoria

Navidad 2019
"Because there was no room for them at the inn."
Detail-A Navidad 2019
Forbidden Christ / El Cristo Prohibido
Detail-B Navidad 2019
Ningun ser humano es illegal / No human is illegal
Detail-C Navidad 2019
"Migrant Protection Protocols": MX police, cartels, gangs.
Detail-D Navidad 2019
Nuestra Señora la Protectora

    La Corua
    A blog of inspirations, interpretations-- things that move me in this place where I'm planted.

    Codices

    All
    Aboriginal
    Barrios
    Border
    Cultural
    En Memoriam
    Folklore
    Graphics
    Migrants
    People
    Sonoran Desert
    Spiritual
    Traditions

    Archives

    April 2021
    September 2020
    December 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    September 2018
    April 2018
    September 2017
    September 2016
    June 2016
    November 2015
    April 2014
    December 2013
    October 2013
    July 2013
    October 2012
    June 2012
    May 2012
    December 2011
    August 2011


 Home | Traditions | Barrios  | People  | Folklore  | Border  | Graphics ​|​ Codex

La Corua-Baboquivari-Mts
*  La Corúa  was a large water serpent that lived in springs of water and protected them. They say it had a cross on its forehead and cleaned the veins of water with its long fangs or tusks. It was a shy creature but could sometimes be caught sunning on the rocks of the spring.  According to Sonoran folk beliefs, if one killed the Corúa, the spring would dry up.  Vanishing water sources and  economic pressures have pushed the folklore of La Corúa  to the dustbin of history on both sides of the border, but La Corúa remains in the minds and memories of elders in the Pimería Alta.

Serpents have been sacred for millennia to indigenous peoples throughout the Americas and are respected as guardians of water sources and bringers of rain.

* Beliefs and Holy Places - A Spiritual Geography of the Pimeria Alta  -  James S. Griffith, University of Arizona Press, 1992

Background painting:  Baboquivari Peak - the monolith landmark defining the Baboquivari mountains southwest of Tucson. The center of Tohono O'odham cosmology, it is sacred and is the home of I'itoi, their Creator and Elder Brother. The peak is visible from Casa Grande in the northwest, south into Mexico.  (I'itoi is also the figure in the O'odham 'Man in the Maze' basket design.)

© La Corua Digital Art | All rights reserved 2022 |
  • Home
    • Roots
  • Traditions
  • Barrios
    • Gardens
  • People
    • Music
  • Folklore
  • Border
    • En Memoriam
  • Graphics
    • THCC
  • Codex