~HOUSE SPIRIT~ESPIRITU de la CASA~

This is an example of what I made last Summer, while we were back in Puerto Peñasco, Sonora.

I absolutely LOVE my beach there! It's so peaceful & an amazing source of materials for a confirmed collage artist.

My inspiration came from an old Tastoan mask that we found & sold last year. It was 10 years old. It was made using a dog's pelvis as the main part of the face. The openings where the leg bones had been attached served as the eye sockets. It had a dried lizard over the 'nose' which held a tiny bird's skull in it's open mouth. The paint was almost completely worn off and it was topped off with a wig of multicolored horse tails. Quite ugly...but, well that's the point of a Tastoan mask.
Anyway, my husband just had to have it for the shop...I hated it! After we hung it in the shop, I shuddered when people would look at it. I wished it would go away...quickly! One day, someone wanted a closer look at it. I decided to model it. Gazing upon my transformation in the mirror was an amazing experience! All at once I felt the magic that it held! That's when I knew what I just had to do with all those fascinating bones and bits of treasure that I'd been collecting from the seashore for all those years!

Even though my collection is quite large, many times I must make a special search for just that right 'something' to complete the vision. This piece was one of those. I had to put it on the back burner because I was stuck at a certain point. As luck would have it, the very next morning on my beach walk, Calafia tossed it right at my feet...something rare at our end of the Sea of Cortez. You can see it there in the crown, just above the pearly oyster, a piece of very large scallop shell weathered to a bluish/pinkish cast. on it flowed from there. The face is made of a pelican's pelvis with eyes of  glass marbles washed up from somewhere. There are lots of 'twirly-middles'...snail shells worn down to resemble flowers and vines, or...? The dragon's breath is made of 'worm shell'. She sports a fish vertebra, pink barnacles and even a pearl.