Ofrenda update - today's regular post is right below

 A couple people have asked how the ofrenda project is going. The first post about the project was HERE (click to see it). April 24 seemed like a long way off from October 30th - the day to set it up at the museum. That would have been 6 months. Here I am - writing this in mid-June -- and it's amazing how long it takes to get everything coordinated.

I need to get the skull put together - as it is the *crown* of the while ofrenda. I had to come up with a scale model - without spending more than a half hour - and did this. The three layers will be plywood - each one approximately 30 inches tall - 

The bottom tier will be 34" tall and a little over 9-ft wide. The *shelf* is 18" deep. I needed to create a life sized mock up of the top two tiers and include the *shelf* part of the bottom tier. Thanks to persistent hoard reduction combined with the hoarding of newly emptied boxes.... I have enough empty boxes and containers to built the top two tiers. Not the full thing - just the front 50%.

This isn't finished. But it gave me enough of an idea to visualize the amount of space to fill on the bottom shelf and the middle shelf. The 2-ft skull goes on top of the third tier - the stack of plastic boxes.

This was the very rough layout that I did to show to the committee. It looked a lot better in real life because it was collaged and gave a better 3D effect. The aesthetic of ofrendas is a lot of stuff. This one has to show all the past 24 ofrendas that have been built. The photo in the center is the person who brought the whole idea of celebrating Day of the Dead to the museum. He passed away, so he is being honored on this 25th year.

I deeply regret how the flower arch looks. Once I got going with collage - I couldn't switch back to drawing. I had to use collage for those doily things - they have a name - papel something. 

I'm writing this on June 14th - and hope to have the skull built by the end of the month. I put Janet in charge of tissue paper flowers and she knocked it out of the park. I hope she doesn't regret being so good at making flowers....

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July 3

I finished the skull before I took off for my 3 weeks in Chicago.

The small one is about 10-inches tall and was pretty easy to make.

The large one is 24-inches tall and it was easy to see how to adhere the pieces together - but very complicated to manage the pieces.

Patty and Janet helped with the cutting out of the pieces - which you can see in the foreground. They have my ever-asking gratitude.