From the Mystic Voodoo website: “Oshun is the Santeria goddess of love, art and dance. Erzulie Freda is the voodoo loa of romantic love.” (For more about Oshun, visit Voodoomama’s lens Oshun on Squidoo.) Oshun and Erzulie are closely related. I see Oshun as more earthy and natural, and Erzulie is more of a glamor girl.
I felt inspired to digitally paint a portrait of Oshun and then found that my friend Denise Alvarado, the “voodoomama”, had painted a portrait of her within days of my project.
I sketched Oshun out first, but then intuitively I felt Erzulie Freda needed to be added. I’ve been watching hours of America’s Next Top Model lately and have become impressed with Tyra Banks. She seems to embody both Erzulie’s - Freda and Dantor - and, though unconsciously at first, I could see as I worked that she was the model for my depiction of Erzulie.
If you look carefully in the background you can see Erzulie Freda’s veve. And the hearts are there, sprinkled throughout.
Painted in Photoshop with a Wacom tablet. As usual. heArt #108 of 1001.
January 19, 2008 at 7:59 pm
Hi Gretchen!
It was my pleasure to list your website in my blog. It was just a teeny tiny expression of gratitude for sharing your source for the Snowgirl background. I’ve been in and out of Graphics-Illustrations many times since you shared that information. Every time I mean to leave a comment there, I get sidetracked. But, I promised myself today will be the day that I do leave a “thank you” on that site. I just subscribed as a reader to your blog. You have so many cool things here and so many great links. It’s going to be a great adventure and a lot of fun to explore!
Hugs, Julie
January 22, 2008 at 11:37 am
I love these goddesses!