Gina

I don’t really know Gina very well. She’s a friend of a friend, the intermediary being the irascible PJ Christie. Gina and PJ played together in a band called Rabbit Hatch back in the pre-K days. They played at our 2005 Samedi Gras party, as pictured here.

So obviously Gina is a musician but she’s also a visual artist. I remember seeing a show of hers on Julia Street, but I’m pretty sure that was before the flood, because it all seems very hazy, like it happened a long time ago. When I heard through Facebook that she had a show of new works up at Delgado, I thought it would be fun to take my daughter to the opening.

And it was fun. The show is called The Call of the Alluvial Empire, and I was really knocked out by the work Gina has on display. Persephone enjoyed it too. That’s indicative of the broad appeal I think this art has. These pieces are colorful and funky and halfway between quilts and paintings: kinda-painted, kinda-sewn. They are extraordinarily beautiful, joyous and also wistful but not sappy in the least. This is stuff that I imagine would win the love of hipsters and grandmas alike. And if you are lucky enough to have a hipster grandma — well, you need to take her to see this show.

In fact, I was so impressed I had to go back and take a second look this Wednesday. I took my camera with me and snapped a few photos. I suppose this is an egregious violation of Gina’s intellectual property rights. (So Gina, if you read this, just say the word and I will take these down.) You can see many more photos of her work on her website. These humble don’t even begin to do the work justice, but I hope they convey a bit of the flavor, as well as the color and texture, and most of all the level of accomplishment.

So actually I guess the main point of this post is just to say you really need to check out this show. The work is up until the end of September, and the gallery is open weekdays 9AM-4PM. It’s on the third floor of the main building on Delgado’s main campus. Totally worth the trip. Trust me on this.

This is the second installment in my new resolve to write about other people every so often. I suppose I should establish a new category for this. But I already have too many categories, and the only title that’s come to mind is the Sartre epigram, “Hell Is Other People,” which might be deemed an insult to my subjects…