Culture and Coexistence into the Great Unknown
B. Traven, German underground author, anarchist and writer of the Treasure of Sierra Madre, purposely obscured his origins to evade consequences from his revolutionary past in Germany and to stoke his literary mystery that hinged upon his words: “An author should have no other biography than his books.”
Mexico’s traditional celebration of Dia de los Muertos embraces the inevitability of death. Painting faces in the style of Santa Muerte (Saint Death), Calavera Catrina (Dame Skeleton), or another loving tribute to the counter-Guadalupe icon Frida Kahlo pays homage to the beauty in death, offering eye-candy sugar skulls in tribute to the ancestors.
For the last 40 years, Detroiters have fled the once-majestic downtown core for the bucolic image of sprawling suburbia. Now an urban revival in the name of “Detroit Future City,” complete with forests, parks, farms and waterways, is planned to overcome the financial mismanagement and industrial blight that have plagued the city for far too long.
Ellen Brown writes on how the Detroit bankruptcy seeks to sacrifice pensioners to pay off the big banks, appearing like the “bail-in” template pushed upon Cyprus which restructured their insolvent banks using depositors funds while sparing those from other banks and governments. Stephen Colbert sums up the situation with some levity as Detroit fights its way back to solvency.
Detroit must overcome its landscape sprawl and its prime benefactor: the automobile, to revive the economy and become an environmentally sustainable 21st Century city.
Viewed today, Rivera’s “Detroit Industry” murals might have prefigured Detroit’s downfall, but also envision a renaissance. It harkens to the earth, the races living and working in harmony, where sections of the city have been cleared of distressed neighborhoods and allowed to regrow with food crops, grasses and trees.