Category Archives: Bolivianos
Q: What lies in the future for you? (Question from “Cultured Focus Magazine”)
A: I still have so much to say and share through my work! First, I want to continue creating and adding to the “Boliviano” series of pastel paintings that I began in 2017.
Second, Jennifer Cox, my director, and I are considering making part II of our film, “Barbara Rachko: True Grit,” which will require a return trip to Bolivia – to the Museum of Ethnography and Folklore in La Paz, where I first encountered the masks that are my current subject matter, and to Oruro to see similar masks in action during Carnival celebrations. This will be a complex undertaking and the issue of financing will first need to be resolved. Stay tuned!
Comments are welcome!
Q: What’s on the easel today?
Work in progress
A: I continue working on “Oblate,” soft pastel on sandpaper, 26” x 20”. I often say that titles can come from anywhere and here is a great example. “Oblate” came to me thanks to a sign on Route 95 in Maryland. It says, “Oblates of Our Lady of the Highways.” An oblate is a person who devotes themselves to a religious order. I like the word and thought it a fitting title for this painting.
I have been driving that stretch of Route 95 for more than twenty years. Only now, as I wrote this blog post, did I uncover a fascinating story about “Our Lady of the Highways.” https://www.ncregister.com/news/our-lady-of-the-highways
Comments are welcome!
Q: What’s on the easel today?
Work in progress
A: I started a new small pastel painting!
Comments are welcome!
Q: What’s on the easel today?
Work in progress
A: I am working on a small 26” x 20” pastel painting called, “Harbinger” that, for once, is coming together rather quickly.
Comments are welcome!
Q: What’s on the easel today?
A: This is a preliminary charcoal drawing for my next “Bolivianos” painting.
Comments are welcome!
Q: How large is your collection of Mexican folk art objects?
Part of my collection
A: I began collecting these figures in the early 1990s. I haven’t counted them, but my guess is that I have amassed around 200 pieces of various sizes. This includes some Guatemalan figures. I went to Guatemala in 2009 and 2010. Since I divide my time between a house in Alexandria, VA, an apartment in Manhattan, and a studio in Chelsea, a portion of my folk art collection resides in each of these places.
Since 2017 I have been creating pastel paintings in the “Bolivianos” series, which exclusively use my photographs of Bolivian Carnival masks as source material. Occasionally, I will add one of my smaller Mexican or Guatemalan figures to improve and enrich a painting’s composition. Otherwise, my Mexican collection sits gathering dust. My thinking and my ideas, not to mention my travels, have evolved and just naturally moved on with time.
Comments are welcome!
Q: What’s on the easel today?
“Apparition,” soft pastel on sandpaper, 58” x 38”
A: “Apparition,” soft pastel on sandpaper, 58” x 38,” awaits some finishing touches.
Comments are welcome!
Q: What’s on the easel today?
Work in progress
A: This is my second day working on a new “Bolivianos” pastel painting. Next I will layer black Rembrandt soft pastels for the background. It usually takes 4 or 5 layers just to cover the 400 grit sandpaper.
Comments are welcome!
Start/Finish of “Narcissist,” soft pastel on sandpaper, 20” x 26”
Start
Finished
Comments are welcome!
barbararachkoscoloreddust.com 