The Smiling Spider

I first met artist Rosanna Esparza Ahrens in early November of 2007 at the El Gallo Cafe when East LA was preparing for Dias de los Muertos. Rosanna is Sticky Rick’s Artistic Director, a business created by her husband Rick Ahrens to connect the world’s stickiest artists and provide them with their sticker printing needs. Rosanna and I met again recently at her home in her native East Los Angeles. This interview is the result of these two encounters.

TACO: By mistake I just went to meet you across the street at the El Gallo Bakery, but as soon as I entered the bakery I realized this was no mistake, I was totally swooned over by the sweet aroma and the welcome of a very unlikely character who tempted me to bite into, not an apple, but a voluptuous piece of bread. There was something blatantly erotic in that act. It was as if Death was challenging me to bite into flesh i.e. live fully! I’ve heard people say Dias de los Muertos is for people obssessed with death but this character seemed awfully alive to me… and definitely naughty!

Rosanna Esparza Ahrens: I hear this too. But death is not something you can avoid, it’s all around us. Look, the El Gallo Cafe where we are sitting right now is an old mortuary! (Laughs)

Blue Calavera by RoZANna.

TACO: There is a puzzling prevalence of skull imagery everywhere in LA, in fashion, bumper stickers, advertisement etc. but most of it is aggressive and charged. Your skulls are so incredibly peaceful. You come from a family of artists whose body of work spring mostly from the Day of the Dead tradition. Tell us about this early influence.

REA: My grandmother made her roots here from Mexico, she never called herself an artist but she truly was one. Her art was cooking and cake-making, she was the go to person for wedding cakes, any kind of cakes. She also drew. She made all these paper decorations, flowers, garlands for her Nativity installations at home. My grandmother made four altars a year, one for was for Sabado de Gloria, the Saturday before Easter and this one was always white representing the Resurrection; one for Dia de los Muertos, the other one was for Our Lady of Guadalupe which is December 12, and the fourth altar was for her Nacimiento or the Nativity installation. Except for the Nacimiento, my grandmother’s altars were not big, they were just little niches up on the wall or on a table but their presence was always felt. On the other hand the nativity scene was a monumental altar which filled the whole living room, with everything to scale from Jesus, Mary and Joseph to dinosaurs and alligators. (laughs!)

My grandma collected figurines, they’ve been in the family for more than 70 years, some were imported from Italy, they’re beautiful. She also had little pieces from Mexico. My grandma would make the nativity scene look like it took place in Mexico. It never looked like Bethlehem, I mean they weren’t Hebrews, they were Mexicans! (laughs) My grandfather would build terraced platforms and lots of little villages. My mom, Ofelia, started painting backdrops on big canvas that looked like the night sky cityscape of Mexico City or Guadalajara.

Artist Ofelia Esparza in front of the altar she designed for the 2007 Pico House’s art exhibit: “Sacred memory: honoring the dead across cultures.” Ofelia told me the altar wasn’t truly completed until you lit the candles. But the fire regulations of the ancient Pico House prevented her from lighting them.

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