El Muerto Se Fue De Rumba by Eduardo Michaelsen

Eduardo Michaelsen. Detail of El Muerto Se Fue De Rumba (The Dead Went Partying), 1996. Print. 24 x 28 in. Courtesy of Beth and Greg Milliken.

Inspired by a popular song in which a deceased partygoer returns to life, a surreal and colorful funeral service unfolds around an open casket. All around, a cascade of mourners, some partially or fully nude, others clothed in elaborate garments, cry and dance. Some are heavily accessorized with flowers and feathers. A skeleton lies in the casket, playing a stringless guitar, joining a Latin rhythm produced by a trumpet and a harp. Even the casket, from which two mystical arms emerge, joins them by beating the drums. The room they are in is adorned with ornate patterns, flower motifs, and elegant columns. And it can be experienced from different perspectives at once: the casket from above, the walls head on, the floors from an angle, and the mourners in various stances. Colors are blotchy but remain inside the bold, black outlines that outline every figure and object within the artwork. The art is replete with various bright hues of green, red, brown, blue, and especially gold for all of the characters involved while the flooring and walls are mostly drab and moody shades of gray and brown.