Toque - Baile - Cante Flamenco

Plaza de Toros - Poster 1921

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Opera / Carmen, Trinidad Artiguez

“The work of art must seize upon you, wrap you up in itself and carry you away. It is the means by which the artist conveys his passion. It is the current which he puts forth, which sweeps you along in his passion”

- Pierre Auguste Renoir

Édouard Manet - Watercolor - 1865

I am a aficionado - of Bullfighting - as we already know...but as life is larger than a single interest..we expand in to music/opera/ballet/dance, painting and writing....from Plaza de Toros....to Goya, Manet, Picasso, Barnaby Conrad, Hemingway....

Photo by Grey Villet

Vicente Escudero, La Argentinita (1898-1945), Carmen Amaya (1913-63), José Greco , Antonio ( "El Bailarín" ) Ruiz Soler (1921-96), and El Farruco (1936-97) were all Flamenco dancers -

Flamenco a mixtures of cultures......Arabic, Gypsy, Indian......music..handclapping....once..a way and voice of protest...

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Photo by Gjon Mili

...Flamenco seductive movements of elegance, wild, aggressive, desire, rhythm, the guitars are playing - hands of sounds, hearts are beating furiously, temptation, eyes of desire,

Painting by Jose Villegas Cordero, 1884.

Plaza De Toros - like the Matador fights his Bull to the end "el momento de la verdad".... Flamenco - Challenge your heart......into a world of life....

"La Fiesta Brava"...

Bullfights and Hemingway.....the man who created his own myth and lived it to the fullest

I have always had a great passion and fascination for bullfights and it shows in my home where bronze sculptures, books and paintings are telling their stories of an ancient art form. When there is time on a Sunday afternoon...""La Fiesta Brava"". I have watched some beautiful bullfights in Bogota, Colombia...and many other places where appriciation and understanding of this art is part of the culture and the people - especially in Latin America and Spain. Hemingway had his passion for bullfights, deep sea fishing, hunting, conversations and life in it's own way. It is all about creation of your life as an art and nothing is more important than to live it to the fullest.

(All photos taken by Loomis Dean in the 1960s)