Blog Archives
Pearls from artists* # 722
Barbara attending Carnival in Oruro, Bolivia!
*an ongoing series of quotations – mostly from artists, to artists – that offers wisdom, inspiration, and advice for the sometimes lonely road we are on
One of the most insidious kinds of pressure to which an artist can succumb is the pressure to be accessible. Well-meaning advisors may tell you that x is acceptable, marketable, popular and wealthy. But if you alter your work to be more x-ish, people will spot it as inauthentic; it will not be heartfelt because it does not originate in your own being. By all means develop and revise your work to communicate more and more clearly; but if you alter one word in order to please some imagined market “out there,” the integrity and originality of everything you do is at risk. You get off the sure base of what you really know and are. Whereas if you create your own material in your own way, developing art work that is more and more authentically yours, people will spot it as genuine. In resisting the temptation to accessibility, you are creating a genuine space and living in it.
Stephen Nachmanovitch in Free Play: Improvisation in Life and Art
Comments are welcome!
Q: What’s on the easel today?
Charcoal drawing
A: This preliminary charcoal drawing is my first tentative move towards the next “Bolivianos” pastel painting. I took the reference photo in February during my Bolivia trip to research and experience Carnival in Oruro.
Comments are welcome!
Travel photo of the month*
*favorite travel photos that have not yet appeared in this blog
In Oruro with Rodrigo Paz, the President of Bolivia
Comments are welcome!
Q: How do you think your recent trip to Bolivia will affect your work?
Reference photo from my trip to Bolivia
A: I have been back in the United States for one month and I know from past trips that there is always a long gestation period as I reflect on colorful new experiences, new sights, sounds, etc. My three and a half-weeks in Bolivia were non-stop, intense, and just full of so many high points. Bolivia is a fascinating country with profound cultural riches, and exceptionally warm and welcoming people. I experienced new friendships and events that were way beyond anything I could have imagined. In short, there’s a lot to process!
In the immediate aftermath, back in the studio I am deliberately selecting more vibrant colors and bumping up the contrast and drama in the painting on my easel (“Gatecrasher”) as I attempt to reflect some of what I saw and experienced in Oruro during Carnaval. I have begun to plan a pastel painting based on the mask pictured above, which I photographed in La Paz. We shall see what new work is created over the coming months and years. For now, it’s exciting to be reenergized and to have new subject matter with which to work. And, at this early date, I can barely conceive what our new Bolivia documentary will be like!
Comments are welcome!
Q: Do you have any big projects coming up?
A: I certainly do! I have been a painter for forty years, and for most of that time, my work has been shaped by foreign travel. At seventy-two, I find myself thinking about legacy — what I want to leave behind. Documenting my creative process on film has become an essential part of this objective.
In the “Bolivianos” series, I have been creating pastel-on-sandpaper paintings that transform the vivid masks of the Bolivian Carnival into universal archetypes. I first encountered these masks at a museum in La Paz in 2017.
Circumstances have aligned perfectly for an exciting next step: another trip to Bolivia and a new documentary. Our upcoming film will be a follow-up to the award-winning “Barbara Rachko: True Grit” (released in 2023), marking a deeper exploration of my thirty-five-year engagement with folk art from Mexico, Central America, and South America.
(See https://youtu.be/JJWLy84kXI0?si=v7JHIq9ViYGgs76U)
In February 2026, I will return to Bolivia with a two-person film crew to experience Carnival firsthand — to immerse myself in its rhythm, history, and meaning. Recognized by UNESCO as a Masterpiece of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity, this festival offers an extraordinary window into Bolivia’s cultural soul.
Our film will chronicle my journey as essential research — a vital continuation of my creative inquiry over these past decades. With this trip and film, I hope to create my next body of pastel-on-sandpaper paintings, rich with color, spirit, and the enduring vitality of Oruro’s Carnival.
Comments are welcome!
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: Would you describe your current work in a few sentences?
A: Of course, my art practice continually evolves and so does my thinking about its meaning. Using my own iPad photographs of Bolivian Carnival masks from Oruro as source material, for the past five years I have been slowly building a rogue’s gallery of beautiful, if somewhat misunderstood, characters probably best described as oddballs and misfits. For me, the paintings have a deeper meaning as archetypes of the collective unconscious. Creating this series is an act of genuine love. It is my hope that the ”Bolivianos” pastel paintings convey my deep respect and compassion for people around the world.
Comments are welcome!
Pearls from artists* # 516
*an ongoing series of quotations – mostly from artists, to artists – that offers wisdom, inspiration, and advice for the sometimes lonely road we are on
In Oruro, Bolivia, devotion to the Virgin del Socavon (Virgin of the Mineshaft) migrated from the fixed festival of Candlemas (2 February) to the movable feast of Carnival. By delaying their public devotion to the Virgin until the four-day holiday before Ash Wednesday, Oruro’s miners were able to enjoy a longer fiesta than if they had confined it to a single saint’s day. During Oruro’s Carnival, thousands of devils dance through the streets before unmasking in the Sanctuary of the Mineshaft to express devotion to the Virgin.
Evidently, the festive connotation of devils is not always demonic. In Manresa [Spain], the demons and dragons celebrate the restoration of liberty after a brutal civil war and subsequent dictatorship [General Francisco Franco]. In Oruro… the masked devils protest exploitation of indigenous miners by external forces and devote themselves to a Virgin who blesses the poor and marginalized. Festive disorder generally dreams not of anarchy but of a more egalitarian order.
Max Harris in Carnival and other Christian Festivals: Folk Theology and Folk Performance
Comments are welcome!
Q: What art project(s) are you working on currently? What is your inspiration or motivation for this? (Question from artamour)
A: While traveling in Bolivia in 2017, I visited a mask exhibition at the National Museum of Ethnography and Folklore in La Paz. The masks were presented against black walls, spot-lit, and looked eerily like 3D versions of my Black Paintings, the series I was working on at the time. I immediately knew I had stumbled upon a gift. To date I have completed seventeen pastel paintings in the Bolivianos series. One awaits finishing touches, another is in progress, and I am planning the next two, one large and one small pastel painting.
The following text is from my “Bolivianos” artist’s statement.
“My long-standing fascination with traditional masks took a leap forward in the spring of 2017 when I visited the National Museum of Ethnography and Folklore in La Paz, Bolivia. One particular exhibition on view, with more than fifty festival masks, was completely spell-binding.
The masks were old and had been crafted in Oruro, a former tin-mining center about 140 miles south of La Paz on the cold Altiplano (elevation 12,000’). Depicting important figures from Bolivian folklore traditions, the masks were created for use in Carnival celebrations that happen each year in late February or early March.
Carnival in Oruro revolves around three great dances. The dance of “The Incas” records the conquest and death of Atahualpa, the Inca emperor when the Spanish arrived in 1532. “The Morenada” dance was once assumed to represent black slaves who worked in the mines, but the truth is more complicated (and uncertain) since only mitayo Indians were permitted to do this work. The dance of “The Diablada” depicts Saint Michael fighting against Lucifer and the seven deadly sins. The latter were originally disguised in seven different masks derived from medieval Christian symbols and mostly devoid of pre-Columbian elements (except for totemic animals that became attached to Christianity after the Conquest). Typically, in these dances the cock represents Pride, the dog Envy, the pig Greed, the female devil Lust, etc.
The exhibition in La Paz was stunning and dramatic. Each mask was meticulously installed against a dark black wall and strategically spotlighted so that it became alive. The whole effect was uncanny. The masks looked like 3D versions of my “Black Paintings,” a pastel paintings series I have been creating for ten years. This experience was a gift… I could hardly believe my good fortune!
Knowing I was looking at the birth of a new series – I said as much to my companions as I remained behind while they explored other parts of the museum – I spent considerable time composing photographs. Consequently, I have enough reference material to create new pastel paintings in the studio for several years. The series, entitled “Bolivianos,” is arguably my strongest and most striking work to date.”
Comments are welcome!
Q: What’s on the easel today?
A: I’m working on another large (58” x 38”) “Bolivianos” pastel painting based on old Bolivian masks encountered at the Museum of Folklore and Ethnography in La Paz four years ago. The masks were made to be worn in annual Carnival celebrations that happen in the mountain town of Ouroro, about a three-hour drive from La Paz.
Comments are welcome!
