Traditions

TRADITIONS

Celebrations of the people

La Fiesta de San Juan

La Fiesta de San Juan 2014

Tango at El Tiradito

My own interpretation, estilo Tucson.

Tango at El Tiradito 2019

Fiesta Grande Street Fair

One of my fondest memories in business as La Corua was providing the promotional art and graphics for the Fiesta Grande committee for a couple of years. Sadly, this proud tradition was put on hiatus but I so look forward to its return one day! It was the best Chicano street fair in the Southwest, IMHO -- they had it goin' on. I donated all my posters and digital files to them for future use. ¡Andale!

Artist's tidbit - what I loved most about this project was old memories of Lowrider Culture in the L.A. Harbor area, 1960's-70:
The now classic oldies music. Cruising the various strips on weekends. Chicano and Surfer car clubs showing off. (White on brown gang fights...) Sneaking booze into community dances where the fledgling El Chicano and Malo were playing.

Fiesta Grande Promotional Poster 2014

Fiesta Grande T-Shirt Design

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* 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.)