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Posts Tagged ‘mexico’

A Day of Architecture and Art in Tijuana, Baja California, Mexico {Sketchnoting}

Posted in art,poetry,writing, tagged , , , , , , , on June 13, 2018| 3 Comments »

You heard me talking about Visual Notes before. Sketchnoting is something I’ve started to explore lately.

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Pink Sunsets and Sunrises { Watercolors and Zentangles in the Bay of the Angels}

Posted in art,poetry,writing, Experiments, Watercolor, tagged , , , on April 19, 2018| 2 Comments »

I just got back from another lovely stay at my personal retreat away from the world and telephone connection: Bahía De Los Ángeles in Baja California, Mexico.

I brought *all* my watercolor stuff with me (acquired some pretty awesome new pearly Japanese watercolor pods) but, typically, not watercolor paper- so the first experiment on drawing paper turned out a bit flat.

One of the guests i met at Mauro’s Posada, my Baja California home, had watercolor paper with him (!) so the water/sand beach scene shows a bit more promise. Still learning/ playing with watercolor techniques…

I also (re)discovered the zentangle technique and it has been fun to conduct a little tangle class with my friends –they call it “yoga for the mind” or meditation in action. I find it very freeing and love, as with collage, not knowing the outcome.

Below are some of the best sunrises and sunsets I have ever witnessed.

I put all my best photography from this trip on my Instagram page, @sketchbloom, so if you want to see more saunter over there.

The time in Baja California- and México- never fails to transcend into the magical, to bring unexpected gifts. The ones always awaiting are authenticity, peace and heart-naked beauty.

As for the others…who else/what else are you going to find and meet in a place named Bay of the Angels?

This place is an anachronism, the last Macondo…off-the-grid living, with no telephone towers, post office, atm’s or even too many people. It is a place for dreamers, wanderers and seekers. It is hard to get to – and always heals.

It is a place for reading, for the mind to be quiet. I took down some poetry lines, to be shared soon.

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A Love Letter to Mexico {City}

Posted in Architectural Photography, Architecture, art, art,poetry,writing, Coffee, Design, Drawing, Ink, Mexico Lindo y Querido, Photography, Poetry, Quotes, sketchbook, Traveling, wanderlust, writing, tagged , , , , , , , , on November 28, 2017| 2 Comments »

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The French poet Paul Valéry said that all things are generated from an interruption. I learned this from my favorite Italian thinker, Alessandro Baricco, here in en español, whose lectures – to be found only in Italian – I listen to to learn about literature, writing, and life.

There were many interruptions this year, and not just personal. I can think of the devastating Hurricane Irma in my beloved, beautiful Puerto Rico, or the September 19 earthquake in my favorite city this side of the Atlantic, Ciudad De México – which occurred on the 32nd Anniversary of an earthquake that killed more that 10.000 people.

My personal earthquake and hurricane happened on August 21 of this year, when my dad passed away. I can now finally begin to write this sentence, and about it, without being swallowed up in the chasm that this loss left in my life. I know his spirit went back to his sea, where he returned, and I feel he is near, both inside my heart and dancing around in freedom and light. I like to think I can take him with me wherever I go now, and share my life in a more immediate way. I like to think his energy was transformed into waves of the sea. The sea can hug you, yet you can’t hug the sea, his immensity. I like to think he is in a butterfly, sometimes in a song. A friend of mine wrote “I heard your dad went back to the Universe”. I like that.

My dad loved the Old Man and The Sea, drawing boats and fish, Jonathan Seagull, reading, Venice, watching documentaries on nature, fishing, and working on his boat. He loved his friends and he loved me. He is the reason art is in my life. He is the reason I read One Hundred Years of Solitude in middle school (I used to raid the books of his youth unbeknownst to both my parents). It became my favorite book, it still is, and magical realism, anarchy and arcane literary worlds shaped who I am.

I thought about coming back to SketchBloom with a post on Van Gogh, and the film Loving Vincent, which I saw this month. The movie reminded me of my dad, of his love of painting, his simple bedroom , and his fisherman shack on the beach, La Baracca Del Bucaniere, which he lovely composed for the last ten years of his life here on the Earth school.

That post is in the pipeline, and I took new photos of his sculpture when I was last in Calabria –  but I wanted to return with a sketch, a return to art.

I just got back from Mexico (that is how the locals call it, Mexico…no need to use “Ciudad de”) yesterday, where I finally got over my protracted artist’s block.

Here, a simple sketch (above) and some photos/vignettes/stories I bring back from my trip.

Walking in Coyoacán – Frida’s neighborhood:

Scenes from Roma, one of the neighborhoods of DF:

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This is Barba Azul, a cabaret from another era, where salsa is danced from midnight till dawn, where there is an altar upstairs (I have seen them in parking lots, too) and where the exit is a tiny rectangle carved into a decorated garage door- something out Pinocchio’s Paese dei Balocchi (toyland)…or a circus in a Fellini movie. One of the many surreal vignettes of this metropolis.

Unfortunately I could not take a better photo of it (with the usher emerging!) but it is on my list for next time. I also learned about the ficheras , the ladies of the establishment who sell a dance for a token (and more, at their discretion).

The obligatory photo of the Palacio De Bellas Artes, November 2017 version:

Where I had the chance to see Diego Rivera’s murals…

…and learn about the Rojo Mexicano (the red pigment from cochinilla bugs found inside the cactus fruits in Oaxaca, which was utilized in paintings around the world from the XV Century to the XIX) and see Van Gogh’s Bedroom At Arles with my own eyes (!!!).

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I also visited Cuernavaca, La Ciudad de la Eterna Primavera (The City of the Eternal Spring), where i completed my yearly self-evaluation for #work in a garden within Jardines de Mexico, surrounded by butterflies. Talk about INSPIRING.

Italian Garden at Jardines De Mexico (my favorite, obv)

In Cuernavaca, I stayed in a copy of Unité d’Habitacion (but if you follow me on Instagram you already know this).

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I want to close with a poem by Octavio Paz — who is considered the greatest Mexican poet and thinker — and, of course, was a native of Mexico City.

This is his poem Hablo de la Ciudad | I Speak of the City. Below the text in the original Spanish and the translation in English.

This poem perfectly encapsulates what Mexico City is. I have more posts on La Ciudad to craft, from my previous visits, and more poetry- but this shall suffice for tonight.

Here is to more gentle earthquakes and hurricanes in 2018, inner ones to bring soul renewals, and to a kinder year.

For the Aztecs, this was the bellybutton of the Moon.

Nos vemos pronto, Tenochtitlán.

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Tribute to Puebla, México 

Posted in Architectural Photography, Architecture, art,poetry,writing, History of Architecture, Photography, Watercolor, tagged , , , , , , , , , , on August 12, 2017| 2 Comments »

A Thousand Churches (Your Eyes). Graphite, Watercolor, India Ink. August 12, 2017.


Dear Single Reader,

You might have thought I had disappeared, and would be the third person in a week to ask me what happened to my sketchbloom…but I’m back for the summer.

An international conference in Hong Kong , research writing /presentations and academia have absorbed me until the end of June…not to mention that thing called life, and heart, and two moves in two months ( apartment renovation). It has been CRAZY. 

I just got back from two amazing weeks in Puebla, Mexico where I was part of ArtFest17 and went to teach at UVM (Universidad de la Valle México) a workshop called Myth of the City.  

Here you can see all the work done with my students and read about Puebla, the “Second” city – the first being of course, Mexico ( Ciudad de). It was an incredible experience, after having co-taught the course in Santa Fe, New México in 2013 and 2014. One could say I went from New Mexico to “Old” México with this.

In Puebla i was surrounded by “my people”, migente, artists, intellectuals..the bohemians and the romantics, and got back my creative juices!  Now, a new beginning…

I have lots of travel photography and new poetry to share so stick around 🙂 

Thank you for reading me and not forgetting about me ❤️ your support means everything to me, as art is and always be my first love- and the true love of my life. 

I am on an art-recovery program but I don’t know what to do about those pesky writing deadlines…#thestruggle. Life is so full, and exciting new design opportunities –like being a juror for Orchids and Onions in San Diego and a Pecha Kucha presentation on Storage Cities — keep presenting themselves. It’s accelerated, beautiful life…yet art needs the half-time of dreams.

Well, wish me good luck, there are some posts in the pipelines so I will see you soon and… work in progress as usual! 

I do hope you are having a glorious summer.

Below are some photos from lovely, lovely Puebla… two of my students’ models and the City that is home of so many incredible riches. A true treasure of humanity/ patrimonio de la humanidad. 

PS: I have been posting on Instagram but have to confess I always feeel guilty if I don’t post drawings/sketches/watercolor/collages… after all it is called Sketchbloom not Photobloom ( but you can follow me [@sketchbloom] there and it would make me so happy😊.) 




Puebla, Estado de Puebla, México:

What a magical city: Baroque churches where Tllaloc and Quetzacoatl are venerated, the fusion called Barroco Indígena ( San Francisco de Acatepec and Santa María de Tonantzintla – Barragán’s favorite church), Aztec temples and cities, 400 year old stone buildings, the tallest church towers in Mexico and the greatest covered stepped pyramid in the world ( Teocalli de Cholula)…finally the oldest public library of the Americas. Puebla is where the battle celebrated during Cinco de Mayo took place and where the Mexican Revolution started. Wow. 

Take a look…




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Messages and Patterns {Deep Attention}

Posted in art,poetry,writing, Mexico Lindo y Querido, Photography, Quotes, wanderlust, tagged , , , on February 20, 2017| Leave a Comment »

Reflection through glass of my favorite morning view, the terra-cotta tiles from my windows. I feel my gaze is always southward, Mediterranean, drawn to the Sun

I love the aging cracks of my favorite lilac mug. These cracks represent our relationship, and countless mornings where the heat of coffee or tea strained the enamel into a filigree of imaginary landscapes, or sea creatures


When choosing amongst different photographs of a subject, I always ask myself “Which one makes you dream more?”

I want to leave you with this quote today, shared by my Yoga teacher Michael Caldwell:

“Love is paying deep attention to your life.”

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