Side By Side

Child of Oaxaca, oil on canvas, 80x100 cm

Since moving to Mexico, Amy and I share a studio and make our art side by side. It is a happy arrangement. We listen to music and occasionally look over the shoulder of the other to see what’s happening. She has her own style and so do I. We are different in mind and background when it comes to art. Nonetheless there is plenty of common ground.

Just today we are finishing paintings. I made a large piece with a native Oaxaca girl as subject. She is someone I saw not long ago. With her sister, she was in the the town center sitting on a sidewalk, selling little drawings and sketches made with colored pencils on paper. Amy and I bought a piece from her older sister. I took photos of both of them and the younger one had a slightly forlorn look. People were walking by without slowing down. The girls were dressed very nicely. My painting is made with oil paints.

Between Snakes and Hummingbirds, acrylic on canvas, 60x90 cm

Amy is finishing her second of a three part series titled Daughters of Tonantzin. The new work is entitled, “Quinto Sol / Entre Culebras y Colibríes .“ ( Between Snakes and Hummingbirds) A tribute to the power of innocence; and the magic and majesty of the universe.

Steven Boone Artwork

Amy Cordova y Boone artwork

All Things Pass

Today, instead of writing much, I am sharing a picture. I took the photo at the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe, in Berlin, Germany. I was there this time of year, four years ago. During those days, I wandered across the city, camera in hand, prepared to meet the unexpected, and thriving on chance and surprise to fill me with awe.

The photo is mysterious, in that the angles are sharp and clear, but a blurred figure is running among the rows of concrete slabs. You the viewer do not know it, but he is pushing a baby carriage with a little child. It is strange to be at this memorial, and find people playing games there. Little children dart in and out of the rows, playing tag, and hide and seek. You can hear their laughter. They seem unaware that during the holocaust, over 11 million innocents were killed, including 1.1 million children murdered.

Underneath the stone slabs are exhibit halls that detail the slaughter of Jewish people during the reign of the Nazi’s—1933-1945.

“All things pass...Perhaps the passage of time is a kind of healing, or a kind of salvation granted equally to all people.”
― Mizuki Nomura, Book Girl and the Suicidal Mime

To see more artistic photography by Steven Boone, go to Graphixshoot