Story
Horseshoes, as a lucky symbol, are an interesting contrast with the skull imagery... - Dolan Geiman
All my collages begin with an underlay of vintage papers affixed to a wood panel and whitewashed with acrylic paint. Details of the base underlay are allowed to peek through the painted surface. (Look closely for musical notes in the background of this piece.) Then, nothing else was painted. The rest of the collage artwork was composed entirely of vintage papers, searched, sorted and selected for the perfect color composition. Each piece of paper was hand-cut with regular scissors to fit within the piece.
For this piece in the Vaquera cowgirl series, I wanted to explore the motif of horseshoes, often displayed with roses and symbolic of good luck. These lucky symbols are an interesting, if not ironic, contrast with the skull/vertebrae imagery and are a nod to the playful, celebratory treatment of death in Latin American culture (Día de Los Muertos) that I explore in my Sugar Skull pieces. The bright pink colors of the Vaquera (Cowgirl)’s shirt mirror the roses and the overall tone of the piece.
