Flores McGarrell
August 31, 1974-January 12 2010
We are, to co-opt our dear friend's lovely self-descriptive catchphrase, Going With Flo. We are scattered across the world, bereft, and traumatized from having lost him; however, we are determined to begin the task of carrying on his legacy now rather than later because we know that in the second he took his last breath, his work became our inheritance. We all refuse to accept the horror of the present as the actuality of Haiti's future; we vow to finish what Flo started in Haiti and, specifically, his beloved Jacmel. We love Flo and what he stood for.
We love Haiti.
This blog will be facilitated collectively, as we know Flo would have wanted it to be. If you have a memory or a story or a photo or a piece of work about/of Flo, please leave a comment and we'll get in touch with you and put it up here.
The photo above is from Art21 Blog, where Flo gave one of his last interviews; in these hours where we're obsessively picking through all types of media that are mentioning him, this interview stands out as being such a wonderful, accurate representation of our Flo. We are unsure of who to credit for the photo; we certainly hope you all will read this interview in order to get a better sense of who our Flo really was, and why we love him so fiercely.
http://blog.art21.org/2009/08/28/inside-the-artists-studio-flo-mcgarrell/
We are now and forever Going With Flo.
XOXO.
This is a beautiful tribute
ReplyDeleteThis is beautiful, Robin- thank you so much for putting it up.
ReplyDeleteThanks robin
ReplyDeleteThanks Robin, great job.
ReplyDeleteHowdy all, for all folks in San Francisco there will be a gathering in honor of Flo at Dolores Park on Wednesday, Jan. 20 at 7p.m. Please come and celebrate our love for our dear beautiful friend.
ReplyDeleteFlo's famous phrase was actually "Go With Flo"
ReplyDeletenot "Going with Flo" (or "Going with the Flo" as i have seen on some folk's FB pages).
I don't mean to be picky, but Flo was pretty adament about this. Robin, perhaps you could just change the text on the main page on this blog (whenever you have the time). changing it's adddress would be too much at this point and i really want people to be able to find the site as they bookmarked it. thank you so much for all the work you have done here. this is a great resource for those who don't use FB and i read it every day. ...Clara Jane Timme
Hi Clara Jane- thanks for reading. we are/I am very well aware of what Flo's phrase was/is; were I not close enough friends with him to know that, I probably wouldn't have felt moved to start this site. the address "gowithflo.blogspot" was already taken- it was the first one i tried- so i had to pick something else. i also feel like using his phrase exactly the same way that he did isn't quite morally right- it was HIS phrase, not ours. hence we're co-opting it, not taking it verbatim. "go with flo" is something that is and always should be flo's. i am going to make an entry about this though, to clear up confusion.
ReplyDelete