“Actually, I thought about a specific old friend before a specific old tree,” said George Rodrigue when he found out about the 250-year old Youngsville Heritage Oak, destined for destruction next month to make room for a temporary road. George’s connection to the small Louisiana town called Youngsville, near Lafayette, was his best friend RomainContinue reading “Saving an Oak Tree (for Romain)”
Author Archives:
Meet Tiffany, the Original Blue Dog
It was an accident that a terrier/spaniel mix named Tiffany found herself involved with an artist’s legacy years after her death. The Blue Dog, in truth, has little connection to the Rodrigue family pet. Instead, its roots lie in a Cajun story, the loup-garou, a scary legend about a werewolf-type dog that lurks in cemeteriesContinue reading “Meet Tiffany, the Original Blue Dog”
New Paintings
“We all know that precious things come in small boxes,” says George Rodrigue. “Art and scale have a definite relationship. Words that describe the size of art tend to explain it in a unique way. “When I first saw Mount Rushmore, I thought ‘monumental, historic, breathtaking,’ hardly the right words if the sculpture was sixContinue reading “New Paintings”
Mardi Gras Silkscreens: A History
George Rodrigue created his first Blue Dog Mardi Gras silkscreen in 1992. He designed the simple, strong image by hand, drawing the outlines for each color on a separate sheet of tracing paper to make the six-color print, and emphasizing the traditional Mardi Gras colors of purple (justice), gold (power), and green (faith). The printContinue reading “Mardi Gras Silkscreens: A History”
Good, Good, Good Friends (Three New Orleans Chefs)
Artists and chefs share a natural bond. Creating unique art or food, they separate themselves from the pack, or from the yardstick as George would say, recalling a professor who explained, “Art is like a yardstick (held horizontally), with the Mona Lisa at one end and black paint on a black canvas at the other.Continue reading “Good, Good, Good Friends (Three New Orleans Chefs)”
Counting on Art (and Painting by Numbers)
George Rodrigue first picked up a paintbrush in 1953 when his mother brought him the latest American craze, paint by number sets, to ease his boredom as he lie sick in bed with polio. By the early Fifties the masses saw paint by number as affordable, do-it-yourself art. But even as a young boy, GeorgeContinue reading “Counting on Art (and Painting by Numbers)”
Mardi Gras Colors on Paper
Since his earliest Cajun paintings, George Rodrigue painted the parades, costumes, and colors of Mardi Gras. Over the next six weeks (leading up to March 8th, Mardi Gras Day), I’ll explore that history within this blog, including his Cajun posters for small town Louisiana carnival traditions; twenty years of Mardi Gras Blue Dog silkscreens; photographsContinue reading “Mardi Gras Colors on Paper”
A Winter Adventure: Trapped in Gallup, Freed by a Meteor’s Crater
Not since I was a child at Ramstein Air Force Base in Germany* have I seen snow like we saw this week. Along with our friends Barbara and Tony Ricciardi of Carmel, California (who you might remember from our recent brush with death, “Swamp Women”), we traveled a short two hundred miles in a longContinue reading “A Winter Adventure: Trapped in Gallup, Freed by a Meteor’s Crater”
Rodrigue vs. O’Keeffe: Choosing Magnus and Murphy Over the Great Modernist Painter
It’s a snowy day in Santa Fe at last. George Rodrigue and I made the most of this past week’s clear weather, however, spending a day exploring an ancient turquoise mine owned by our friend Doug Magnus, a jeweler and artist in the area. …And another day within the Georgia O’Keeffe Museum. Once again, asContinue reading “Rodrigue vs. O’Keeffe: Choosing Magnus and Murphy Over the Great Modernist Painter”
New York Art in West Texas
I could spend the rest of my life traveling and writing about the West. That’s what I thought to myself as I sat with George Rodrigue in a café in Marfa, Texas and watched the barbershop across the street. The barber, visible past a single strand of colored lights and his barber’s pole, shaved hisContinue reading “New York Art in West Texas”