Coco
Are you wondering why I am combining two series, ‘Artists I Love’ and the current ‘Breast Week’? Coco is the reason. She was the inspiration for Breast Week because she just recently had a mastectomy as a result of her second bout with breast cancer. Her first was 15 years ago. She also happens to be a life-long artist.
Coco – 1972 High School Yearbook
A Long Time Ago
Coco went to school with me starting when I was about 13 until high school graduation 6 + years later. She was one of a handful of people in school who were designated, like I was, as ‘the artist’. Turns out, now that so many of us are reconnected via social media, we realize our school (Darien High School in Darien, Connecticut) produced a prodigious amount of amazing artists, but back then some already had shown such talent that there was no doubt they were and always would be an artist. Coco was at the top of that list.
Alas, as often happens after high school, I lost track of most everyone, including Coco. I moved back to California where I was born and it made keeping connected pretty hard. It was long before social media and unless you called or wrote a letter it wasn’t going to happen.
Cape Cod
Fast forward many decades and my family is going on vacation to Cape Cod and Boston. I post a note on Facebook letting my friends on the east coast know that I am coming their way and ask them who I may know on the Cape. Coco’s name comes up. I connect with her after 30+ years and find, no surprise, that she is still a practicing artist.
Linda, Caitlin and I made it to Cape Cod and I was able to visit Coco in the summer of ’09. It was the first time I had seen her since we graduated from high school. She was busy with some commissioned paintings and contemplating a kitchen demolition and remodel. It was great to see her and her fantastic place.
Coco’s backyard
Coco – 2009
Coco’s Art
I also found that she had breast cancer more than a decade earlier and that she painted a series of self-portraits during that time.
Inner Child Prays – Self-portrait
Coco’s self-portraits – displayed in her home
The paintings are powerful in color and emotion, but diverse in feeling and depth. It’s like seeing someone they way they see themselves, a rare gift we don’t often get to experience. She does what the best artist’s do: she exposes herself with emotional courage.
Coco at Her Opening – Photo by Steven Specht
She also has done amazing work in landscapes, portraits, and collages. Here is a selection.
Landscapes
Above All Else – 2007
Kehoe’s Dune – 2007
Kehoe’s Dune – close up – note the hint of a home behind the dunes
The Painted Whale
Coco Larrain – Painted Whale – 2005
Painted Whale – in progress
Drawings and Paintings
Coco Larrain – Ishmael’s Wisdom
Woman with Red Gloves
Collages
Cat and Bird Games – collage
Moth and Apple – collage
Cancer
Coco found out recently that she had breast cancer again. She is facing it with the same incredible endurance and creativity she faced it last time. She is embarking on a portrait series of her self once again. This time she is enlisting the help of a very talented photographer, Julia Cumes, to document her journey. Check out Julia’s blog, Apertures and Anecdotes, to read about her interactions with Coco as they have completed the photo sessions so far.
Coco Before Surgery – Photograph by Julia Cumes
I am so looking forward to seeing how her courage and creativity will push her, and us, forward into fantastic and profound moments of art. If you would like to explore more of Coco’s work, you can see it at her website, Coco’s Artwork.
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Winter 2012/2013
Winter 2011/2012
- Week #10 – Coco Larrain
- Week #9 – Nina Levy
- Week #8 – Andy Goldsworthy
- Week #7 – Wayne Thiebaud
- Week #6 – Richard Diebenkorn
- Week #5 – Roy Lichtenstein
- Week #4 – Thomas Hart Benton
- Week #3 – Edward Hopper
- Week #2 – Henri Matisse
- Week #1 – Rembrandt
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coco.
remember that 1st fight that you won, was it worth it? if so, then do it again.
peace..kevin mcauliffe
She seems to me to be like fine china. It may look delicate but it is as strong as it gets when put under stress.
Thanks for posting this, Marty. I will write to Coco at her website. She has always been a magnificent artist.
Gigi, You are welcome. Honestly I didn’t know how good an artist she was when I first saw her work on her website years ago. It was only after exploring the pieces again and again that I saw the depth.
Beautiful piece Marty. One amazing woman!
Thanks Bill, indeed she is!
Very beautiful piece about such a beautiful person, Coco. I, too, have only learned of her wonderful art and incredible challenges through FB. Thanks, Marty.
Thanks Heidi. Social Media, for all it’s distractions, has been a wonderful vehicle to find and build relationships from long ago. I am very happy to have found so many from my youth, makes me very happy.
Oh Marty! I am SO moved by this!! INcredible. SO beautifully written and designed.
Thank you, dear friend, thank you.
I am glad you like it Coco, nothing makes me happier.
Thank you Marty for this wonderful photo essay about Coco and her art, her journey through breast cancer and her response to it. So creative and affirming!
You are welcome Nancy. She is creative affirmation at it’s best!
I love your artists that you love series!
Thanks Beka. I am finding that the ‘Artists I Love’ series is getting a lot of traffic from searches since most of the artists are well known nationally and internationally. It’s got me thinking about how I can have all my postings include really famous people! haha
Great piece Marty. Really terrific. Love to you too, OCOC, if you see this!!!
Thanks Sis!
Thank you, Marty, for this heartfelt glimpse below the surface and about what really matters. Coco, a pleasure to see a little of your amazing art work. ‘Take no prisoners’ in your fight #2.
Libby, you are welcome! I agree with you Libby – Take no prisoners Coco!
Dear Marty, Thank you for your creative and dearly expressed photo essay here about our friend Coco.
Our forever dancer and artist girl is a very very strong woman! Coco is an inspiration.
I met Coco when she was taking a class at Castle Hill in Truro one summer ages ago, while she was recovering from her first battle with cancer. We then worked there together the next two years!
I am so impressed with everything she does, everything she touches around her.
I send prayers that this latest surgery, and treatments (?) will be the last.
GO COCO!
what a wonderful page of memories and hope!
dinah
Dinah, thanks for your own contribution to what we know about Coco!
Thanks, Marty, for sharing Coco’s story and work with us. It’s rare to see such diversity in an artist’s work. I especially liked her “Inner Child Praying,” her landscapes and her collages. And that whale looked like it had jumped out of the ocean into her hands! What a brave and inspiring woman! May she live long and continue to bless the world with her amazing gift.
You are welcome Pauline, I am glad you were able to see her artwork.
I love this blog Marty – thank you for honoring my friend and her amazing journey. Coco is a force of nature who turns her pain into the most exquisite art. She inspires me.
Nicola, You are lucky to have her among the artists of Cape Cod, no doubt!
OH MY. You all have me eyes all welled up !! I don’t find words, right now, I’m just S O moved.
Thank you all, SO very much!
I was asked ~ by my most amazing yoga teacher, Trisha Duffy ~
“What is the best thing that has come out of having cancer this time?”
It is absolutely the PEOPLE who have sent me love in SO many ways, thru SUCH kindness and healing words! Feelings spoken, typed, emailed and FaceBooked ~ Feelings expressed in every delicious, succulent food that’s been made especially for me!
And it’s the people who have physically helped and it’s those who will be helping. SO many gifts, I’ve received, in SO many ways, from so many people!
I am humbled by all the love and support I’ve been receiving.
IN MY GRATITUDE ~ I am documenting my process from all facets possible. It will be a tribute to all of you, a journey for all of us. I am photographing those of you present and I am photographing/documenting my experience on a regular basis. I will use emails and written messages. Blogs made and photos taken by you, photos I take of gifts given and friends helping… . . . . .
All of which I’ll transform into a book and exhibition of photos, paintings and drawings. It will be about my body and my journey, and about you, all of you, who’ve helped me heal. It will be FOR you, you who are just embarking on or are in, or finished with the breast cancer journey. My goal is for it to HELP others as you have helped me. Community uniting to help others. THAT’s the good stuff Life’s made of!
Coco, you said it right. What’s left when all the money, fame, careers, jobs, worries and triumphs are done? Friends, family and expressions of love are what’s left. I am so excited to see the continued visualization of your journey and so happy to be part of it.
Thanks so much Marty for shining a light on Coco and bringing us together to share in her story so that we may join forces in sending her a collective embrace of encouragement and support.
Coco…may our appreciation for you and the warmth and laughter you have brought to our lives be reabsorbed into your body in the form of healing energy. You go girl!
Patty, I love the idea of a collective embrace. It’s exactly what is needed, not just for Coco, but for most everyone!
Thanks Marty for writing this and thanks Coco for sharing your life with cancer with us. God Bless you both and Coco keep the faith!
Coco,
Thanks for sharing so much of yourself and your journey.
I wish you every blessing in the days ahead.
Lindsay
What more can I say than what was said. Thanks, Marty, for your “down home” style and the love we can see through your art. CoCo is an amazing artist.
Eyrline
thank you coco for being open about your life. your strength makes me feel strong.