I love board games. Playing board games with my family members have created many of my fondest memories growing up. It's hard to find fellow adults to play games with, but maybe this recreation of a well known game, Mexican Bingo or Loteria, will get some fellow gay boys playing.
Félix D’Eon doesn’t have a name for his latest art series, but that hasn’t stopped people from asking for it.
“I’m just calling it gay lotería, but I think I’m going to give it an actual title later on,” D’Eon said in a telephone interview from his studio in Mexico City.
D’Eon, 36, is reimagining the traditional “Mexican bingo”—or lotería— by putting a queer twist on the 54 iconic images that adorn the original game’s deck of cards.
The original game, introduced in 1887, came with 10 game boards and a deck of cards featuring simple illustrations such as a hand, a human heart, and a parrot.
Artists have long been inspired by the classic card illustrations, but D’Eon is giving the entire set of cards a makeover for the queer Latinx community.
“Everything I do is queering something that wasn’t queer to begin with,” D’Eon said. “All of my work is about creating a place where you feel like you belong.”
In some cases the card redo is a slight tweak to an existing image, while in other cases the Chicano artist creates an entirely new card altogether. For example, D’Eon’s remake of the “La Sirena” (the mermaid) card shows a topless merman floating on the sea, while a completely new card design titled “La Muxe” shows a member of the Zapotec cultures of Oaxaca that are redefining gender norms in Mexico. – fusion.com
Thanks fusion.com for introducing us to Felix! Read more about his art and the game over at fusion.com.
Would making a game more LGBT oriented make you play? I think some of these pics may make me pick up this game.
For more on Mexican Lottery, we went over to Wikipedia. Simple question, simple answer.
Lotería is a game of chance, similar to bingo, but using images on a deck of cards instead of plain numbers on ping pong balls. Every image has a name and an assigned number, but the number is usually ignored. Each player has at least one tabla, a board with a randomly created 4 x 4 grid of pictures with their corresponding name and number. Players choose what tabla they want to play with, from a variety of previously created tablas. Each one presents a different selection of images.
Lotería is the Spanish word for lottery. The deck is composed of a set of 54 different images, each one in a card. To start the game, the caller (cantor, or singer) randomly selects a card from the deck and announces it to the players by its name, sometimes using a riddle or humorous patter instead of reading the card name. The players with a matching pictogram on their board mark it off with a chip or other kind of marker (many Mexican people traditionally use small rocks, crown corks or pinto beans as markers). The first player with four chips in a horizontal, vertical or diagonal row, squared pattern,any other previously specified pattern, or fills the tabla first shouts "¡Lotería!" (Lottery!) or "¡Buenas!" (Good!) and is the winner. – wikipedia.com
Head over to wikipedia.com for a description of every card.
Felix, we're ready for our deck!
For more of D'Eon's art, search his Instagram page at https://www.instagram.com/felixdeon/
h/t: fusion.com