Mexicali Inspired

Sometimes one image sends you into a creative stream and you're off.  Sometimes you're in an emotional place and one image echoes the feeling.

I was feeling rather tender-hearted and decided to 'work it through' in a collage.  I began with a simple Google search on 'heart'. When the powerful images of the arrow-through-the-heart Mexican Loteria cards showed up, I knew I found the right symbolism.

I've always loved the Loteria images and collected several sets while in Mexico and many more images on-line..  Loteria is a bingo-type game using images, but I've noticed some people are using the images for a Tarot-type reading and creating interpretations, such as in this blog, The Quest. There is, of course, an overview of the game Loteria, at Wikipedia.  I also liked this piece from MOLAA, the Museum of Latin American Art, in Long Beach, CA.

I was drawn to El Corazon, the heart, because it was powerful.  Interestingly, today while writing this blog, I learned that one version of El Corazon, means that although you are missing the beloved, they will return.  So the image of pain is embedded with hope for renewal.

El Corazon

I found another powerful image in my google-quest, a wonderful Loteria tattoo.  It features one of my favorite cards, El Sirena, a mermaid.  So she inspired the next card in the stream.

Blind Loteria

Then I was scanning through my own collection of Mexican images and looked into my Frida Kahlo file.  And so the stream ebbed with this Frida with Frida collage.

Frida Con Frida