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The late great Ed Keeylocko

9/10/2020

 
Keeylocko was his own unique brand of rancher (no pun intended) - who understood the interplay and connection between all living things and bred his cattle accordingly.  He was a U of A graduate with a degree in agriculture and was concerned about how the lack of foresight and degradation of the natural world would sustain a growing population.  He was a  proponent of environmental education, and built a little research  library  that contained out-of print books about ancient civilizations around the world.  (A man after my own heart!)  He considered himself to be a steward of the land as well as a cowboy:
“Now, here’s the thing that you have to remember about a place like this. You’re the curator for everything that lives, breathes on that range. Anything that moves, yells, swims, hunts. You’re the curator. That means birds, bees, skunks. There are beehives on my range, but when there are no blooms and there’s no flowers blooming, they get hungry.
So we have to bring sugar water to feed them. You’re the caretaker for everything on that range no matter what it is. If it’s a skunk, if it’s a snake, whatever it is, that’s your job."
- Quote from 2016 article in MensHealth

(Click on detail photos to enlarge.)
Ed Keeylocko & Jazz
With his horse, Jazz
Ed Keeylocko close-up
ed's horse
Nicole Santa Cruz in the Seattle Times, 2010: 

"Keeylocko was born in South Carolina in 1931. Abandoned by his mother, he was rescued by a woman who gave him the name Keeylock (he added the O later). He left home at 14 and traveled America as a hobo before serving in the Army for 23 years.

He then attended the University of Arizona, earning degrees in agriculture, because he wanted to breed aggressive, well-armed cattle that could protect themselves on the range. (“Give them back their horns,” he says.) After experiencing discrimination at a cattle auction, he decided to create his ranch.
Keeylocko’s life is as unpredictable as the Wild West. He’s an ordained minister. And he has traveled the country, giving lectures on black cowboys.

“There are people that believe that people like me only play basketball, football, dance or maybe play the banjo,” he said. “What they don’t know is, there were black cowboys long before there were white cowboys.”

His life has made him open to welcoming anyone in his town, regardless of color, or as is the case in southern Arizona, regardless of citizenship. He’s known for chasing the Border Patrol off his property.
“I tell people that Cowtown Keeylocko doesn’t choose who comes here,” he said. “That’s the real West.”
Those he welcomes include illegal immigrants who come for water — from the U.S.-Mexico border, less than 50 miles away.

On a recent afternoon, Keeylocko continued to nurse his tequila at the bar, sweating slightly. Aside from the faint hum of a fan, which didn’t provide much relief, the only sounds were insects chirping. Keeylocko’s eyes became soft...
“A person has to go back to the land,” he said. “It creates thought.”
I first learned about this remarkable man from an old episode of Arizona Illustrated and fell in love -- then, as usual, life happened.  In 2018, when I heard of his passing, I did an extensive web search,  gathering articles and photos and watching videos of him and his life, and vowed to do a painting of him. Then the Trump War on Asylum Seekers sucked up national oxygen and my attention turned elsewhere.

Then the triple-header of Ahmaud, Breonna, and George Floyd ripped my life foundations out from under me.  I was raised with a set of values that promoted diversity-- albeit as God's Christian soldiers.  I did have racism awareness growing up and plenty of first-hand witness to Arizona's brand of bigotry.  But the depth and insidiousness of nation-wide systemic racism revealed itself in new ways to me everywhere. It is inescapable by design and white people have no idea how deep it runs, myself included.   America's Original Sin is still the root of who we are... it's just more polished now. It is physically nauseating.

But then I witnessed something incredible: after 400 years of colonial control, a great reckoning seemed to be stirring within many Caucasian Americans as wave after wave emerged from all corners of the country, calling to end the perpetuation of violence and inequality towards black people-- indeed, all people of color on this land we share. 

​All the while Nature's voice was growing louder-- falling on impervious presidential ears, bouncing off MAGA hats and unmasked faces, long-guns and battle-gear, fluttering with "patriot" flags while it claimed thousands of American lives unabated.  Wild conspiracy theories and demonizations flooding social media  were  being believed as fact and stoked by the president, creating real-life threats and incidents.  Victim-blaming was now Patriotism, and survival assistance was now Radical Left Socialism.  It was overwhelming.

So I shut down my Facebook, took time out and rediscovered the world as it really is through the peace of covid sequester in my home. As I sorted through my own countless experiences of sexism and double-standards  I realized that no matter how much I experience and learn I can never know what it is to suffer as a person of color in America. I can only offer  whatever gifts I may have to honor them.

Here finally, after months in the making, is my vision of Ed J.B. Keeylocko.  I brought out his "swamp" green eyes.  Above him is his signature Blue Dog Saloon.  I include his pinto horse, Jazz, who seemed to be a perfect fit for this painting.  He was an incredible man and led an incredible life -- I am sorry our paths never crossed in this world.  For those who had the privilege of knowing him, I hope this portrayal of him comes close to doing him justice.
I'm an old cowgirl from many years ago, so this man and this painting has a special place in my heart.
(Horse nerd note:  registered pintos have dark  bluish bands around  their white markings.)
Picture
I offer digital files of my work free of charge to 501(c)3 non-profits for historical/educational/cultural preservation. This includes Mr. Keeylocko's Legacy.   Feel free to contact me.

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La Corua at Quitobaqutio dies...

9/4/2020

 
This piece of normalized recklessness and profiteering jumped out at me recently.  A July pictorial  in The National Geographic about Trump's border wall captured the essence of why guardian spirits like La Corua and ancient gifts from I'itoi  (O'odham Elder Brother) are meaningless to those who "take no responsibility".

Beautifully written by  Douglas Main  with powerful imagery by photographer Ash Ponder, I share snippets that speak to the heart of the Living Being that is the Sonoran Desert and the decimation of both land and culture that its guardian people, the O'odham, now face. I hope you will follow the link to view and read the whole thing... It speaks to a critical tipping point for an area that exists nowhere else in the world.  When it's gone, it's gone...  And for what?  To make a few white men rich and feed an emperor's vanity. 
A classic, wretched old story... 

White Man's ignorance is a dead-end road. We are already there.
But we are a stubborn bunch.  As long as there is mud in the pond, we will continue to scrape.
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Dusk falls on the pond at Quitobaquito Springs, in Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument. The pond is at its lowest level in more than a decade, exposing mud flats throughout. Photo: Ash Ponders

Sacred Arizona spring drying up as border wall construction continues

Midway down a cactus-covered hill in one of the driest parts of Arizona is a miracle: a spring. Water continually streams out of the ground, down a small channel, and into a pond.

Quitobaquito Springs, as the area is known, is one of the only reliable above-ground water sources in the Sonoran Desert. This oasis long provided water to the Hia-Ced O’odham, a tribe indigenous to the area, and records of human use and habitation go back more than 10,000 years. It’s also home to two endangered species found nowhere else in the United States: The Sonoyta pupfish and Sonoran mud turtle.

“The spring is regarded as sacred, a living element provided to all from our Elder teacher,” says tribal elder Ophelia Rivas, referring to the O’odham Creator God.

But this once-quiet spot within Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument is in trouble. The flow of water, in slow decline since the 1980s, has dropped about 30 percent since March. The pond is at its lowest level in more than a decade, exposing mud flats throughout—a potentially urgent situation for its endangered animal inhabitants.

The pond is 200 feet from the U.S.-Mexico border, and contractors have already dug a six-foot trench for an electrical grid within a stone’s throw of it. Walls are going up several miles to the east of the spring in Organ Pipe and to the west in Cabeza Prieta National Wildlife Refuge. As construction advances closer to the spring, many people fear that the large quantities of groundwater that contractors withdraw to make concrete for the wall could exacerbate falling water tables and dry up the spring. Quitobaquito is probably fed in part by a regional aquifer that’s already been drawn down by agriculture.

“It’s unbelievable; it’s just horrible; it’s going down and down,” says Christina Andrews, a Hia-Ced O’odham leader, of the spring flow and pond level. She’s visited the spring since childhood, and has never seen it so depleted. “It feels like a violation of innocence.”

The wall construction uses a lot of water to suppress dust and to mix concrete for the base. For a stretch of wall built a few miles east near Lukeville in 2008, Customs and Border Patrol estimated construction used up to 710,000 gallons per mile of fence. More may be necessary now, since the new wall is twice as high. To put this number in context, it would take about 70 days for Quitobaquito to produce enough water for one mile of fence.

Border Patrol spokesperson Dyman says that at the moment, the agency “does not calculate the amount of water usage per mile of construction.”
Holding Himdag Together - Leonard Chana

"On Each side the people hold it together, to share M Himadag, O'odham"
- The late Leonard Chana, O'odham artist

(Picture and quote found on Facebook page, O'odham de Mexico.)
The O’odham intensely oppose construction on this sacred land, which also contains a sizable tribal graveyard that is centuries old. While nobody lives at the springs anymore, it’s still used regularly for ceremonies and to pay homage to ancestors. Once difficult to access, the spring now has a road running past it. Large trucks and heavy machinery rumble by continually—and soon, contractors plan to build the 30-foot wall, illuminated by lights powered by electric lines in the already completed trench.

The area around the springs was sold without Hia-Ced tribal consensus to the government in the 1950s and became part of Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument. The O’odham are not only upset about what they see as the desecration of Quitobaquito, but the dozens of miles of fence already put up elsewhere throughout their historic homelands, separating tribal members from their relatives in Mexico. They were particularly outraged when Border Patrol contractors blew up ground in Monument Hill, to the east of the spring in Organ Pipe. The hill contains ancestral graves and a shrine to children.
Picture
There's a fabulous little treasure-trove of a book to learn about the O'odham Children's Shrine, their sacred mountain--home to I'itoi,  Their legends and creation stories, the Yaquis (Yoeme), Native Christianities, La Corua, and other rich stuff:
Beliefs and Holy Places - A Spiritual Geography of the Pimeria Alta,
by James S. ("Big Jim" ) Griffith
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Navidad 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 en 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 just to have "anchor babies" and game our system. 

Fear and victim-blaming has been a wildly successful political weapon throughout history, and each generation seems to breed 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
 
(Note: I hung the proverbial red ball cap on the tip on the tent, lower right.)

Picture
Picture

Tango at Tiradito

10/26/2019

 
​An homenaje to all things wondrous and wild this time of year in our corner of the world --loosely inspired by a local folktale of the disobedient young lady seduced by the devil at a community dance. Smitten, she becomes transparent beneath his gaze. His appearance crosses centuries - skull face and long warrior hair under a classic fedora hat and flashy 40's suit.

The scene is the iconic historical shrine, El Tiradito (The Castaway) - often regarded as the heartbeat of Tucson, decorated for El Dia de los Muertos. 

Ancient deities rule... shining through the moon. But La Virgen de Guadalupe lives on... here on a ball cap that could have been left by a thankful border-crosser. (When one becomes aware of La Virgen, one notices she is everywhere.) 

​As an afterthought I added a curious little dog, just following the trail of marigold petals...
Tango at Tiradito
Tango couple close-up
Tango with the devil
tiradito corner shot
Aztec deities in the moon, La Virgen on a ball cap.

La Visitación

10/13/2019

 

A fresh look at La Llorona - the Weeping Woman

The Legend of La Llorona is one of the oldest in the Americas, and there are too many versions to go into here, but learn more about her HERE.
Nobel prize-winner, Octavio Paz. In his 1950 essay, The Labyrinth of Solitude, Paz describes La Llorona as ‘one of the Mexican representations of Maternity’ and, as such, she is presented as a symbol of Mexican identity. This identity, according to Paz, revolves around Mexicans’ view of themselves as hijos de la Chingada. Paz explains that: ‘The verb [chingar] denotes violence, an emergence from oneself to penetrate another by force … The Chingada is the Mother forcibly opened, violated or deceived. The hijo de la Chingada is the offspring of violation, abduction or deceit.’ This violation is the Conquest, the quintessential symbol of which is La Malinche, or Doña Marina, who despite having been sold into slavery and given to the conquistadors – and therefore having limited agency of her own – has been painted as a traitor to ‘her people’. This anachronistic and highly misogynistic view that lays the blame for the defeat of a civilization at the feet of one (disenfranchised) woman has remained popular to this day. Indeed, Paz himself states that ‘the Mexican people have not forgiven La Malinche for her betrayal’.
My interpretation brings a little redemption to one of the  many maligned female archetypes in global mythologies. The endless repression of females, both  political and religious, is debilitating by design.    I also needed to create something to soothe my spirit after completing the En Memoriam series. Now I can look to El Día de Los Muertos with the joy in which it is intended.

I place La Llorona along the Santa Cruz River, somewhere south of Tubac. No saguaros here - she is framed by mesquite trees instead. I figure by now she's lost most of her hair. And she must be terribly, terribly weary. I put tiny eyes on the butterflies and colorful spots on their bodies to make them special. (Slightly Disney-esk possibly, oh well.) I always incorporate owls into my paintings where the veil between the worlds are thin. It is a guardian keeping watch over the ephemeral scene. Owls are sacred birds in many cultures and I adore them.

I include also a boulder with a petroglyph on it, alluding to the timelessness of the land.

the visitation
the visitation 2
llorona-mariposa
owl
monarchs + mesquite

La Aplicación (The Application)

10/2/2019

 
​This may be the last in my series honoring asylum seekers for a while. It is an intimate capture of the bond between parent and child. The process of painting the mother revealed the ancient classic Maya bone structure of her face. What timeless beauty.  I wonder if they are still alive and together. This administration will go down in history for its crimes against humanity.

I must say here that this brutal saga of America's asylum seekers really struck a nerve. When stories started coming out about what "Zero-Tolerance" was doing to families, children, and babies, I absolutely  could not stand it.

I was still recovering from surgery but was determined to DO SOMETHING... ANYTHING. When the plumbing collapsed at the old Benedictine Monastery (Tucson's primary migrant shelter), a dozen porta-johns were brought in and volunteers built outdoor showers from pallets, tarps, and PVC pipes. Plumber's daughter that I am, I joined one other lovely lady to clean all daily, and continued to do so until the Casa Alitas Program relocated to their swanky new location farther south.
​
When that job went away I still felt compelled to do something to lift up the humanity of these remarkable "throw-away" people who had suffered so much and come so far. That need gave birth to this series of artworks.
Guatemalan mother applies for asylum
Guatemalan child detail
Mother applies for asylum
Original source of photo unknown. I'll keep searching. It is beautiful.

La Rendición (Surrender)

9/28/2019

 
This may be my favorite image of border-crossers. I wanted to paint this couple because I think they are utterly captivating. It's not a new image and has been hanging around on my computer for years. I pray they are both doing well. 

Via the photographer:
​"Flor Garcia, 19, of Honduras, holding her one-year-old daughter, Flor Fernandez turned themselves over to CBP after crossing the Rio Grande from Mexico near McAllen, Texas, on Thursday, July 3, 2014."

Photo: Rodolfo Gonzalez/AP

Surrender
Surrender close-up
Picture
Photo: Rodolfo Gonzalez/Austin American-Statesman

Darlyn Cristabel Cordova-Valle

9/18/2019

 
<< Return to En Memoriam

The twelfth soul in my En Memoriam project honoring asylum seekers who did not survive the rigors of the American border (and hopefully my last, at least for a while):

Darlyn Cristabel Cordova-Valle, Age 10
Of El Salvador
Died Sept. 29, 2018 ​of heart complications, 
Nebraska
Darlyn was encountered by Border Patrol on March 1, 2018, a few miles west of Hidalgo, Texas. She complained of chest pain and three days later, was transferred to HHS custody where she remained for about seven months. Darlyn was treated for a congenital heart defect at various hospitals -- including in San Antonio, Texas and Phoenix, Arizona.
HHS spokesperson Mark Weber told CNN Darlyn had surgery complications that left her in a comatose state. She was transported to a nursing facility in Phoenix and later to Children's Hospital in Omaha, Nebraska, where she died on September 29, due to fever and respiratory distress.

Darlyn was traveling to the US to find her mom, who had migrated from El Salvador to work and provide for her three daughters nine years earlier. She hoped to be reunited with her mother in Nebraska. Her mother asked that Darlyn be released to her care. The government refused.

Her body was returned to El Salvador.
​
​Darlyn's story HERE. 
Darlyn Cristabel Cordova-Valle
Darlyn Cristabel Cordova-Valle
Darlyn Cristabel Cordova-Valle
This seems to be the only photo of this fragile young lady out there. (Source: family, web)

Claudia Patricia Gómez González

9/16/2019

 
<< Return to En Memoriam

The eleventh soul in my En Memoriam project honoring asylum seekers who did not survive the rigors of the American border:
Claudia Patricia Gómez González, Age 20
of San Juan Ostuncalco, Guatemala
Shot by BP agent, May 24, 2018
Rio Bravo, TX
Claudia earned a degree in accounting but had not been able to find a job in her home country of Guatemala, so she traveled 1,500 miles to the United States, hoping to find a job and a better future.  Shortly after she set foot in Texas, a Border Patrol agent shot her in the head and killed her.

Gomez-Gonzalez's shooting drew international attention after a bystander posted video of the aftermath on Facebook Live, showing her lying on the ground, bleeding. Authorities changed their initial account of the shooting two days later, adding to the controversy at a time when the White House has cracked down on undocumented immigrants.

The deadly encounter ended the journey Gomez-Gonzalez started nearly three weeks before in an indigenous community in San Juan Ostuncalco, Guatemala.

The details around the death of this young Guatemalan woman remain unresolved, as the majority of migrant deaths are. And like many others, a wrongful death suit against CBP on her behalf was filed, a year after her death.

Claudia's story HERE.
Claudia Patricia Gómez González
Claudia Patricia Gómez González
Claudia Patricia Gómez González
Photo sources: Gonzalez family, web
Claudia Patricia Gómez González

Johana Medina-León

9/10/2019

 
<< Return to En Memoriam

The tenth soul in my En Memoriam project honoring asylum seekers who did not survive the rigors of the American border.
​Johana Medina-León, Age 25
of El Salvador
Died June 1, 2019
Texas
​Medina's journey to the U.S. had taken months. She had waited for a Mexican transitory visa for more than a month in Tapachula, Chiapas, near the Guatemalan border, Diversidad Sin Fronteras stated. The advocacy group said Medina waited nearly three months in Juárez before she was allowed to make her asylum claim to U.S. immigration officials in El Paso.

​Johana known to friends as "Joa," died at the Del Sol Medical Center in El Paso, Texas, after being detained by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement for seven weeks. Medina had been a certified nurse in El Salvador but sought asylum in the U.S. because she couldn't work as an open trans woman in the nursing profession in her home country. From April 11 to about May 23, her health deteriorated and she tested positive for HIV. She begged for medical attention that never came. 

In mid-May, she had passed her "credible fear" interview, which determined she would be persecuted if she returned to El Salvador, but Leon wasn't paroled until she began complaining of chest pains and was taken to Del Sol Medical Center. She passed away four days later.

​Johana's story HERE.
Johana Medina-León
Johana Medina-León
Johana Medina-León
Photo sources: unknown, web
Johana Medina-León

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La Corua-Baboquivari-Mts
*  La Corua  was a large water serpent that lived in springs of water and protected them. It had a cross on its forehead and cleaned the veins of water with its teeth.  According to Sonoran folk beliefs, if one killed the Corua, the spring would dry up.  Vanishing water sources and  economic pressures in Mexico have pushed the folktale of La Corua  to the dustbin of history on both sides of the border.

Serpents have long been sacred 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
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