Thanks, I really appreciate it. I really fought with myself over whether it was the right thing to do. The idea of doing a memorial, I always thought was spot on, but my big worry was that people might not understand the concept of Vic "en calavera". Most people lump day of the dead imagery in with Halloween. I guess this is partly due to the proximity of the two days, ie. DOD is two days after Halloween. There is no relation at all. Many people also associate skeletons with death(and guess somewhat rightfully so). I don't. I've tried to learn a lot about Mexican culture and the meaning of DOD. Some of the greatest things visually to me are the calaveras, they're meant to be whimsical not morbid. If you ever see a book called "En Calavera: The Papier-Mache Art of the Linares Family" by Susan Masuoka. You'll see a ton of similar tributes to what I have done. One of the greatest stories in the book is about the patriarch of the Linares family, Pedro. He is approached to do an art exhibit at UCLA. The timing is about 4 years down the road. He says what if I'm not living at that time(he was a fairly old fella at the time). The people from UCLA which are standing in his rustic studio in Mexico, just nervously shrug and say more or less don't worry you'll be around. He responds with but what if i'm not? If I die, can I come en calavera? They say absolutely. Pedro did die before the show, but he did come en calavera. Here is a photo of him making sure that this happened. This is Pedro and Pedro en calavera:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/yeudiel24/3679866790/
My point in the end is that I hope everyone gets it the way I meant for it to be. I got an email from one of Vic's friends that said initially it was a bit of a shock to see skeleton vic, but they went on to note of course that it is entirely in keeping with Dia de Los Muertos and that I did a most remarkable job of it. I put forth my best effort.
But as you asked, it is in the window of a small gallery in Birmingham, AL called Bare Hands (www.barehandsgallery.org). It will be there for another week or so, then I guess it will sit in a corner in my house. It is one of 30 or more memorial altars that were in the main gallery space of dia de los muertos. Some made for a parent, a husband, a wife, friend, etc.
I finally got pictures of the lower altar uploaded to flickr. Thanks for the compliments.
