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When Folk Art Makes You Go “WTF?”

When Folk Art Makes You Go “WTF?”

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20180405_180400

Yes, I just shared a painting of a goat pooping out gold on Black Gate. That’s OK because it’s, you know, art.

This is hanging on my brother-in-law’s wall here in Madrid. It belonged to my late father-in-law, Paco Piñuela, a prominent artist in the Seventies and Eighties. When he wasn’t painting, he was rummaging through Madrid’s great antiques/flea market, the Rastro. Thus we ended up with lots of random things in the family, including this odd piece.

I had never heard of a gold-pooping goat, and besides the date on the panel there’s no other information about this piece. So I decided to Google “gold pooping goat” and see what I got. I like to live dangerously.

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Happy Halloween! Here’s Some Nightmare Fuel

Happy Halloween! Here’s Some Nightmare Fuel

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Traditional_Irish_halloween_Jack-o'-lantern

Happy Halloween! Well, it was yesterday or today or tomorrow depending on where you’re from. Anyway, it’s time to see something freaky. This is a traditional Irish Jack-o’-Lantern made from a turnip. Turnips and beets were the popular plants to make Jack-o’-Lanterns out of before pumpkins became available in European supermarkets.

This nineteenth century example is from the Museum of Country Life in Turlough Village, County Mayo, Ireland. The Irish say they got the tradition of Jack-o’-Lanterns because of the deeds of a certain blacksmith named Jack. He managed to trap the Devil through some means (stories vary from fooling him into turning into a coin or climbing a tree and then trapping him with a cross) and in return for freeing him, got the Devil to promise not to put him in Hell.

Once Jack died, Heaven refused to take him and Hell couldn’t take him either, so now he walks the Earth in a Purgatory of his own making. The Devil gave him a bit of a fire in a turnip to help him light his way at night. He’s been called Jack of the Lantern, or Jack-o’-Lantern, ever since.

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