Archief

Pictures of the NAMBIKWARA tribe: taken by CLAUDE LÉVI-STRAUS, Mato Grosso, Brasil 1934
from the book 'saudades do brasil'

HANK WILLIAMS    by Ramblin' Wayn   ink on paper 2008 




Ramblin' Wayn    selfportrait  (detail from the painting 'Wayn & Mulata')  oil on board 1998  

LIGHT IS THE FIRST OF PAINTERS. THERE IS NO OBJECT SO FOUL THAT INTENSE LIGHT WILL NOT MAKE IT BEAUTIFULL

INDIAN CAVE    - OIL ON CANVAS  80 * 50 CM  -RAMBLIN' WAYN  2008



APIATAN (WOODEN LANCE)  KIOWA - OIL ON CANVAS  90 * 60 CM.  AUG. 2008  -   RAMBLIN' WAYN

woman who's pickin' wild fruit    Wayn 2004   oil on board




black mermaid    --chalk on paper   Brazil 2004   Wayn

The good meal combined with the white gin was too much for Juan and soon he felt a-sleep like a new born child in a colourfull hammock, which was a swinging between two walls. He woke up when the sun was allready settin' down. Confused he stumbled outside, took a shower by the waterwell and catched the smell of fried black-beans and fried fish. He walked back inside the cabin and saw the old singer sitting in his chair; this time without hat. His head was bold and just some grey twines were covered up the sides.
 In the shadows of the dancin' candlle lights he looked even more scrawny, a stone throw away from a resemblance of Klaus Kinki's 'Nosferatu the vampire', in the Werner Herzog movie. But it was all romantic, somehow unreal, so it could be only written in a good book.
 Outside Juan heard noises of some men arriving in pick-up trucks; there were five of them, the Sertanejos, the cowboy looking dwellers of the wasteland. Two wearing accordians, one a fiddle and another the Surdo, a big bass-drum. The last one carried a huge curved instrument which makes snoring sounds, which they named Cuica.
'Let's go to the barn,' said the old singer and, leaning on a old walking stick, he stumbled bended down, to the old barn. The barn was transformed like a music-room, a timber floor, a small mixer for voice and instruments, some aged amplifiers and a old piano.
 The little stage was decorated with some mikes and a colorful parrot whom folks over here named 'Jandaia'  flew and produced strange noises around the location.
'Well... this is the place where my amigos are playing our music, music that's touching my soul... the songs of the nordestino, the 'bahiâo' the music of hard times,' and there was a sad look in the old mans eyes. 'You see... music my dear John is a God's gift, something our are born with, a force you'll never get rid off...' The old man took his martin guitar, stepped, curved like a old tree forward to the mike. With tremblin hands he stroke a D and when he started singing there was no doubt in Juan's heart. The sound was fragile, his voice bounced, but clearly recognizable. The song the old man was a moanin' was called 'Honky-tonk blues', and slowly, the accordions joined in, the fiddle was like a cryin' dyin' man out on the street, while the Surdo accompained the rhythm and cuica made strange noises and sounded like a fierce snake. The blues was re-born in the middle of the Brazilian dessert. Juan took his guitar and forgot the world around him, his memories and future. When the song was finished the bass-drum started another beat, a Indian beat and the song told about a wooden Indian whom never bin kissed: Kawliga.
 The old man looked at juan: 'let's sing some together bro...' and he found C major: 'Hear that lonesome whistle blow... It sounds too blue to fly...' Just two guitars, a old Martin & a black Gibson, two voices, two former 'gringo's' in another world, far away from there memories, were succes was just a thing... a dyin' item in a world they would forget, a lonely dusty world, with too many 'messin around' on there minds... Then they sang the 'Lovesick Blues' and Sertanejos joined in and again they played there music in a way, so that no one could deny that music and lonelyness, should be the real synthesis.
 And then when the Sertanejos all ready left in their old truck, the man with the fake name Lucas an de the grey fake gypsy still singing there songs, from 'That's allright Mama' to 'Move it on over', until 'Will the circle be unbroken' make them fall in silence and tears.
The next morning Juan awaked in a hammock and ask itself the question: why this world was so complicated? Mysterious. Because music was more important then fame, the fragility of glamour... and here in the wasteland he found his last episode. Here at this pace he would sing 'till the fatal day! But what could he sing in the future, whart would be his goal? New songs were hard to put on paper? Maybe a new love? A stronger 'Love me tender'?
 The silence was interrupted by the whistling of birds, and faraway he could hear the old man singing 'Weary blues from waitin'', with a voice like a broken chain, a fiddle, a certain melancholic voice with bluesome notes, which made Juan think of negro's on the cottonfields of Mississippi, the labourers at the fields of Mexico, Guatemala, Venezuela, and the slaves on the Brazilian wasteland.

In a old chair in the corner was seated a old man. He wore a kind of 'Panama-hat', white shirt and old faded jeans; he had a skinny face which showed his skeletal-bones. He had big ears and his mouth was like a thin line. His age, seventy nine. His long skinny fingers were tremblin' while holding a decorated pipe and on his feet he wore black leather sandals. Beside him, on a old table layin' three books: the new Testament, Nostardamus and a book written by Thomas Carlyle.At his feet lay a big grey cat, he called 'Tubb'.
'Bem vindo no minha cabana! Welcome to my cabin!, he said friendly but with a broken voice. Juan walked up to the old man, shook his hand and said: 'I'm Juan Rojo, nice meeting you.'
'Lucas Errante (Luke the Drifter),' replied the old man.
'Gringo? He asked with a grin. Now the conversation  was silver-tongued, because the Portuguese of the old man and Spanish of Juan had some paralle's.
'Well... just the way you look at it... sir', said Juan.
'I just came from Venezuela and before that Mexico...'
'And before that? The states? said the old man. But in his mind the question was not essential. Juan turned nervous while sweat danced on his forehead. "Well... there's a clear accent. The South?' asked the old man again in a friendly manner.
'Si  senhor... The south, born in Mississippi,' said Juan with a hesitation. Never he had talk about that, but now he couldn't lie.
'And you... sir? Juan asked the old man while tryin' to coloured his Spanisch.
'Damned... I'm a real southerner, at least at birth son... Alabama, my sweet home,' said the old man with sadness in his voice.
'But, don't let us talk about that Juan, we both still talking reasonable English... let us keep it this way  John... bothers you when I name you... John?'
'No sir not at all,' Juan responded quite confused. The old man called for Mulungu, his 'mulher', a still beautiful Indian woman, in spite her long and tough 72 years. Her black hair were long and entwined at her elliptical shaped haed. She was named after a butterfly-like tree with red-flamed flowers; a child of the Tamoyo tribe.
 'Por favor bring us some booze... meu amor,' said the old man with a high pitched voice. In the meantime Juan couldn't keep his eyes of the lime-wall which was decoraded with some paintings of naked women, climbing snakes and a immitation Gaugin, and a painting of little white lizards, stickin' there like sleeping sugar-diagrams. That wall was also bejeweled with a guitar, hanging on a wooden grip: a old Martin 1947, and that was Juan's object. The old man saw the strong staring of Juan: 'I noticed that you are playing the guitar son?' while looking at his guitarbag.
'Yes sir,'
'May I take a look at that guitar, son? asked the old man. Juan opened his leatherbag and the black Gibson came alive, dusty but respectable, outside a few scratches which she run up during Juans drunken strolls.
'Fine lookin',' said the oldtimer, and touched the black Gibson softly.
'O Senhor... plays also?'' asked Juan naïf and stared passionated at the old Martin on the white wall.
'Music, my son... is my life, it's only life... Now I'm just playing for my soul, my wife, the animals and a few friends... I'm a happy man... son, but also a long gone roving cowboy...'
Juan looked at the old man, named himself Lucas Errante and how he could place this old man in his memory. The old singer had a intensive image of the man which was in Juan his backmind. Mulungu brought some fruit juice and a jug of Jacuba, a kind of cachaça, the great brazilian sugarcane booze.
Than the old man said calm: 'First let us eat something... i can see you are hungry son... Let's us drink for I can see you are thirsty... and then let's rest a little... for I see you are dead-beaten. After that we shall play our music... John... tonight some of my friends will come over and ... we...play some of our music... WE, I mean, the gypsy's of the notes... John,'

will be continued

Juan stared at the oldtimer. Was this a indication? Hell! Who played the same music he did in this dessert? Forgtotten biy the saints? At the gates of hell? Could the old man lead him to this mysterious singer?
'Amanha, vou levar o senhor para lá... It's just a 50 miles from here... you know the old singers cabin lies more in the wilderness... way off the road... tomorrow i'll take you there,' said the oldtimer again.
 That night Juan drunk intensely, while his spirit wandered over lost highways, and back in a time, in fact a period he wanted forget. Moments of fame and fortune, hookers, teddybears, lost loves, just like the lost of his mother and pills. Early next morning he woke up beside Doeria, a sixty-three year old hooker, his company for the last hours. Her fleshy body was naked and he smells the cheap parfume, mixed up with sweat. Her hang-tits were like cow-udders and her buttocks like a grand mauseleum of pulp. Around her eyes where black stains, constructed by make-up who found the way to her copious mouth, so her face was a abstract painting of Salvador Dali and gaved her flabby cheeks a impression of putrecent kaki-fruit.
 Anyhow she tried to let him screw her, because the night was without potential, and it made her ambitious again. She did all she could to raise his feelings, but he felt himself like almost dead. His cock felt like a dyin' breed, and he felt like a galley-slave of which only the paddles were missing. Water! Fresh sweet water and his guitar, were his only thoughts. In the meantime the good hooker Doeria made her tries to let his willy sing again... what became succesfull after a while... yep, Juan was only human... They make love like rabbits in a hurry, she stood up, get dressed, with a lot of shocking words and asked her money. Juan gaved the podgy Doeria his last dinheiro. He remebered her like a echo, a female ghost out from his onexplainable situation. Right, there's no doubt, she was the woman which dragged him upstairs, the hooker Doeria.

He heard the screaming of Filinho behind the door. It was about time to leave and visit the old singer. Juan his head was a mess, his brains misplaced fragments which were collapsing by each move he made. He cleaned up his Gibson, kissed and embraced her and stumbled downstairs. It was hot outside, like hell, in spite the early hour. The sun was a climbing and the evil spirit would be attacking today.
 This was the dry Brazilian land. He got in to a old truck which made putterin' sound when it hitted to road. The blue-sky had a nuance, transparent and there was no string which disturbed the blue carpet. The cactuses seemed pale pieces of art, bizarre little trees on the road to hell and beside that road laying bones of rotten animals, the Vulture's buffet.
 The road was rough with some deep gaps and the oldtimer sung a song wich Juan couldn't understand, something about birds and women, a sad song. When they passed a dry riverbed Juan felt unwell and emptied his stomach. Ten minutes later they passed Sete Coraçôes. The cabin of the old singer lay one kilometer more to the west, a small house made of clay and painted in pastel blue; beside the cabin was a little coral, decorated with a roof of red tiles with two horses standing in the shade. Two barking dogs welcomed them, when the old truch arrived and the old Filinho was cursing at his old automoblie, he named 'old rusty'. A older woman walked up to them en shook hands with the oldtimer. He introduced Juan and drove off on his old Rust. She showed Juan the way into the cabin where it was simple and comfortable and cool like a shady cave.

continued....