Y'ALL COME TO THE ART AUCTION

As part of the fund-raising effort to gather funds for building houses for the poor in Zorillo, Baja California, our congregation is going to hold an "Unknown Artist's Auction" this coming Friday. Members, friends, and other interested folk have been invited to contribute a piece of art, or a craft, or some other artistic creation to be sold in an outcall auction format. Everyone else is invited to come join the action as the items are displayed, auctioned, and awarded to the highest bidders.

Several of our "Favorite" local artists will be participating, and the auction will be a fun event with professional and amateur musicians providing entertainment, great cooks bringing their finest desserts, art items in various media available to the crowd, and even some opportunity to purchase the works of a few of our own beloved artists with whom we are already familiar. And maybe, just maybe, you will snatch up a special treasure by a "newly discovered" talent.

This amateur oil painter decided to join the effort (and fun?) which immediately brought up the dilemma of what picture to paint. Since the whole point is to be able to afford materials to construct several small homes for families in this very impoverished community near Ensenada, I thought I would use a photograph taken by one of the hundreds of people who have traveled there and participated in the project. I borrowed a bunch of photos and alas, I did not find an image that I thought was suitable or which even seemed fairly representative. My eventual desperate solution was to create a composite illustration showing several typical houses and some of my impressions of the surrounding dwellings and "conditions" where this annual mission effort occurs.

It was not really a bad idea, this "painting someone's photograph", but when it came to executing the plan,I found that even with the photos (which were almost exclusively focused on the people) I still did not have a very clear concept of how the neighborhood around the new houses really appeared. Still feeling a bit in the dark, I continued with the only strategy I had in mind, and I will hope that at least my illustration will do no harm to the impressions of others who have not been to Zorillo.

For those who have not seen any other pictures, Yes! the colors of the houses are almost exactly the colors the folk who get to live in the houses choose for the new residence. Very spicy, indeed! It must be a wonderful and happy feeling to receive such a gift, and I can see the bright colors as part of that joy, can't you?

OK. The auction is Friday, April 17th, at 6:00 pm at the Building located just west of Padden Parkway and 94th Avenue. A fifteen dollar bidder's fee includes your dessert(s) , the musical entertainment, and an evening of culture, humor, and edification, and probably a laugh or two - I heard today that the auctioneer is a chap named Ernie E.