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CommentsLiving inside art
LPM Cultural Connections guests experience the Murillos
Chances are you have seen the shadow boxes custom-made by the Chicano artist couple of Kathy Cano-Murillo and Patrick Murillo: wood frames stuffed with tiny art and figures, and covered with gaudy glitter and high-gloss paint.
Now imagine walking inside the different rooms of a life-size shadow box designed to be the fantasy house of the Murillos.
That’s the fun the hundreds of LPM readers and art lovers attending the Oct. 3 LPM Cultural Connections experienced while enjoying a special, meet-the-artists reception of the exhibition La Casa Murillo: A Life-Size Shadow Box at the Heard Museum in Phoenix.
As guests enjoyed gourmet hors d’oeuvres, desserts and cocktails, Kathy – otherwise known as the Crafty Chica, the crafts queen of media and craft store fame – personally and graciously greeted guests while flashing her wide, trademark smile. Her artist/musician husband, Patrick Murillo, had the crowd swaying to reggae from his band, RastaFarmers.
Chatty Kathy conducted guided tours of her fantasy home in the museum’s Lovena Ohl Gallery, spicing explanations of how she constructed the exhibition with comments like, “Our Chihuahuas get very nervous when I pick up the glue gun.”
The unique result is a décor that could be described as “Willy Wonka meets Frida Kahlo.”
“We’ve always dreamed of having a house where everything is handmade by us,” she told LPM. “Because that is what we love to do the most – embellish anything and everything. We also have life-size cut-outs of all us, even our dogs, to give people an idea of what our life is like.”
The show runs through Aug. 2, 2009, so do drop in and visit the Murillo fantasy house and make yourself at home.
As Kathy says, “This is a very personal show that represents a modern American family living an artful life that represents all the things we love: Our culture and each other.”
