El Gato by Sandy Rokoff-Lizut

Please contact 23 Sandy for current availability.
Several years ago I wrote a series of poems about cats including El Gato, an old tom who I encountered each morning while out for my walk and coffee on a visit to La Penita, a small fishing village in Mexico. The poem came from observation and imagination about daily life of the wily stray cat. Several years later I created six illustrations with water-based monotype and collage on Arches paper for the invitational Creatura show at Walla Walla’s Willow Gallery.  Each of the six framed pieces included one stanza from the poem. Reactions and requests from that show led to my transforming the art and poem into this twelve page accordion fold artist book. The book was then reproduced by Color Press Inc. Walla Walla, Washington.  

Artist Bio

“A work of art is a world in itself reflecting senses and emotions of the artist world” Hans Hoffman

As a child I delighted in creating “magical spaces” transforming tiny corners of the cellar or woodlands surrounding our home into my own little worlds: places in which to read, draw and dream. In the early 1960s after spending a year living in France and drawing the Parisian skyline from my little one room seventh story garret (really), I lived in Woodstock NY.  This proved a perfect place and time in life for me to pursue classes at the Art Students League and investigate both hand weaving and silversmithing. I migrated to Santa Fe in 1971, did silver work with jeweler Ross Llewellyn and published six children’s books before creating another, larger “magical space”, The Geranium Slip: a boutique selling antiques, collectibles and “yesterday’s clothes.  Later, in my collage and assemblage work, I began to incorporate objects found and acquired, ordinary and unique, ancient and modern, into pieces of art. In 1998 I became intrigued with and studied monotype printmaking. Ultimately my work gained representation galleries in Santa Fe, Albuquerque, Taos, Scottsdale and later, Bainbridge and Port Townsend, WA as well as juried shows and collections. Passions from the past: writing, visits to my sister’s home in Mexico, and love of animals have melded into a series of pieces for the Creatura show in Walla Walla WA in 2010. The El Gato book is an outgrowth of that show.  It represents my ongoing exploration of more serious poetry writing as well as combining poems with my graphic work in the myriad of ways offered by the wonderful world of book arts.