FishRook
Packed with exposed wooden pallets, art easels and Mexican skeleton dolls, Palo Alto resident and artist Virginia Gutiérrez Porter’s garage art studio will soon be transformed into a complete, immersive altar for Día de Muertos, the Mexican holiday honoring lost loved ones.
For the past two years, Gutierrez Porter, who teaches art at Palo Verde and Barron Park elementary schools, has decorated her garage with flower-filled cans, copious artificial candles and other ornaments directly from Mexican markets. A traditionally designed “carpet” constructed with sawdust and a three-tier altar displaying framed photographs of deceased family and friends has acted as the art installation’s centerpieces. The result is an awe-inspiring, spiritual space, warm and quiet in memory of the departed. This year’s altar will be open to the public from Oct. 30 to Nov. 2.
To Gutiérrez Porter, the altar is not only an exhibition of Mexican culture, but a deeply personal project born out of…
