Joseph Edward Jilbert was born on March 11 in 1956 (a remarkable Pisces Sun Sign and a Virgo Rising Sign)  to a Cherokee mother and a third generation Norwegian American.  Joseph (Jo Jo) grew up on a cotton farm situated on the Mississippi River on the Tennessee border in Hayti, Missouri.  One of 18 children, Jo Jo grew up in extreme poverty. When Jo Jo was only five years old his grandmother told all the children to look through the old Sears Catalog and circle in pencil the toys they each wanted.  She then told them to imagine they had them.  While the others were crying, Jo Jo asked for the catalog back!  Using the photos as a blueprint, he ran around the farm searching for rocks, pieces of wood, crops, tools, etcetera that resembled the shapes of the toys he circled. Once Jo Jo gathered enough material, he pieced together homemade versions of everything he wanted from that catalog.

Because the family often did not have enough for everyone to eat, Jo Jo planted his own secret garden of vegetables to eat.  Two years later at age seven, Jo Jo started experimenting with welding.  His first sculpture was a Catholic cross and his first buyer was the local Priest. The next year at the tender age of eight, Jo Jo was shipped off to Montana to a school for boys.  High school was spent in Job Core.  While still passionate about metal art, this is where he also studied carpentry and forestry.  Graduating top of his class in forestry earned him a $10,000 grant and a one-way ticket to any destination he chose. The Big Apple called out and off he flew.

“Studio 54” on 54th Street in Midtown Manhattan in the heart of Broadway in the 1980s became home to Jo Jo’s DJ career.  It was there that he built decorative sets with various theatrical elements to compliment his music, met celebrities and even my heart throb, Yul Brenner!  Over time Jo Jo perfected the art of making figures out of scrap metal.

In 1992 Joseph decided to move to New Orleans.  The fashion scene became a new passion with Jo Jo designing theatrical costumes.  A male version of Lady Gaga, Jo Jo was known for his love of exorbitant costumes. In New Orleans Joseph managed and owed a number of clubs and restaurants. After a while he started shifting more and more towards sculpting, and at this time Joseph established his art company “Vault”, with 14 employees.  From that point on, Jo Jo immersed himself into commercial neon art and metal sculptures.

Hurricane Katrina struck New Orleans in August 2005 and uprooted everything,  including Joseph’s art studio and his work. With time in Dallas and Colorado and back to New Orleans, it was in 2018, when Jo Jo’s work was noticed by Zappos Founder Tony Hsieh. Tony was deeply moved by Jo Jo’s art, and he invited him to move to Las Vegas and be a part of the Downtown Project. Ever since then Jo Jo has resided in Vegas, where he continues to sculpt and teach metal sculpture.

Jilbert’s metal sculptures, which weigh anywhere from several pounds to more than a ton, include 20 foot tall figures, Indian warriors, robots and aliens. His work is complex, has lot of layers, and storytelling behind it.  Known as “The Metal Whisperer”, Jo Jo is passionate about teaching and donating his time to honorable causes. Ralph Godwin, a wealthy real estate investor, has purchased several of Jo Jo’s sculptures, which he later donated to The Museum of Modern Art (MOMA) in New York.  Jo Jo’s works hang in private collections throughout the United States and are shown in prestigious galleries. Major private collectors include the following: Paul Allen (Architect), Joanna Villerrel (Oil Center), Glen Bordelon (Oil Companies), Danny McGlenn & Sally Fox Coclin (Circa 1857). The Oil Center of Lafayette Louisiana displayed several of Jo Jo’s sculptures for sale to wealthy businessmen and collectors who wanted them for their private collections. 

            Shortly after meeting Jo Jo, the late Harry Leo Duran, MD commissioned him to sculpt himself as the Dancing Doctor.  The somewhat small 2 foot tall portrait needed a base which took longer to create.  When the Notorious Doc died of COVID in November 2021, his widow (me) reached out to see if Jo Jo could find a buyer for the work.  He graciously accepted and the I brought the two pieces back down to Vegas to Jo Jo’s studio for him to rework the pieces for sale.  A portrait actually increases in value once the subject passes away. 

UPDATE: MEMORIAL DAY 2024

  JO JO also paints!

To read more about Jo Jo, please click on the links below!

Joseph Jojo Jilbert’s Metalwork Sculpture

http://ilovelasvegasmagazine.blogspot.com/2016/09/dine-among-fine-art-at-therapy-with.html

Therapy to host an Open House for Sculpturist Joseph Jilbert to Benefit St. Jude’s Ranch for Children Sept. 15

https://www.theadvocate.com/baton_rouge/entertainment_life/art/article_a9f85d3d-450f-552a-a96f-7eec259bbaf1.html

Visions of Joseph – Renowned scrap-sculptor to open massive art studios space and event venue

https://www.yelmonline.com/stories/metal-whisperer-building-spaceship-ray-gun,106626

The Art of Converting Scrap

When the late Harry Leo Duran, M.D., Ph.D., Mph aka The Notorious Doc died, the last thing I ever imagined was becoming friends with people he knew. One is now my realtor, at least until April 15 when the closing on the condo takes place. After that, I hope we keep in touch because he’s been a huge help in answering questions about what REALLY happened in Vegas.

One is an incredible lady who has offered a lot of publishing advice. One is the famous Metal Whisperer. And one is a very nice fellow who only knew Harry as a Facebook pen pal. So, I find it mind boggling that this poor man who lucid dreams often, should find himself in a hospital dream setting with the following dialogue!

Setting: A hospital in the dream world

Purpose for being there: Visiting a friend.

Action: Moving past people both living and dead. – Joe told me he can’t really tell the difference in dreams unless he focuses on WHO is there..

Doctor rushes past.

Two interns who looked familiar walk up

“Hey! Good to see you here! You wanna go say hi to Liev? ”

One of many of Harry’s nom de plumes was Liev Henrique Duran.

Not realizing if Liev was alive or dead

“Sure where is he?”.

The Interns: “Up in diagnostics . Snakeskin said he wanted to say hi! It’s been a while since you had a chat”.

Joe: “Snakeskin“?

The Interns: “Yea it’s what we call him”.

Two people rush past in an emergency. Joe got startled and woke up.

Earlier one of Harry’s other Facebook friends suggested I restructure the Tell All Book along the lines of Dante’s 9 Circles of Hell. Not a good fit. However, the Eastern Orthodox 20 Aerial Toll Houses works quite well. Coupled with Valentina Blažek’s answers on Quora on how to identify a narcissist. And to add sprinkles on top let’s throw in Jackson MacKenzie’s Psychopath Free: Recovering from Emotionally Abusive Relationships with Narcissists, Sociopaths, and Other Toxic People and Whole Again: Healing Your Heart and Rediscovering Your True Self After Toxic Relationships and Emotional Abuse and his blog post “Why Does it Take So Long to Get Over a Relationship with a Psychopath”?

In his blog post, MacKenzie writes:

You have encountered pure evil

Everything you once understood about people did not apply to this person. During the relationship, you tried to be compassionate, easy-going, and forgiving. You never could have known that the person you loved was actively using these things against you. It just doesn’t make any sense. No typical person is ready to expect that, and so we spend our time projecting a normal human conscience onto them, trying to explain away their inexplicable behavior.

And this leads me to the section in my Tell All Book called

Introduction to the Afterlife of a Narcissist: Testifying Against a Narcissist at Each of the Twenty Aerial Toll Houses

The theological material I have had to wade through to write the Tell All Book is heavy stuff. I need to go for a walk. It truly weighs on the soul. If you, or anyone you know has dreamt about Harry Leo Duran since November 8, 2021, please contact me IMMEDIATELY and don’t forget to leave a comment.

This post is for Joe Reed who asked me about the photo I posted on Facebook.

On Wednesday, March 16, 2022, I got out of the house and drove to Elko. The Western Folklife Center had advertised a night of Celtic music and I wanted to get there early to get a front row seat and a decent parking space. After marking my chair (with my jacket) right next to the little stage area, I asked if I could kill time in the little museum area. During the day, you’re supposed to pay but no one seemed to pay attention so in I went.

On the far wall were paintings of kachinas. Most of the walls were covered with scenes of Western life but his one had kachinas and because no one was around, I burst into giggles. SERIOUSLY, MORE kachinas? It’s not like I don’t have a Butterfly kachina doll in my bedroom, my late husband’s yei rugs, and now etchings downstairs plus a copper plate of one and Yei, but there I was faced with paintings. And the magical Yei ceremonial blanket safely packed away in the back to keep it in its sacred state.

The photos I took have glare from the overhead lights so I went in search of clear images. But before doing that I clicked on the Current Exhibition page and discovered that the Jo Mora Exhibit is only going to be up until April 23! When I got home blathering on about it, no wonder I got a blank stare. These lithographs have only been on the wall for less than a year and they’re not going to be there for much longer!

The embedded video is a bit misleading – Peter Hiller does not work at the folklife center. Click on the image and you’ll download his CV. It’s fascinating. But more than that take a look at the Navajo rug behind his desk. No Talking God.

The exhibit had more information about the prints.

It would be great if all archival material was digitized but alas this one is not. it is the only collection I could find without having access to a research library database. If you’re really interested, you’ll need to contact the University of Tulsa to see if you can make an appointment to view these super rare photographs.

So here are the 8 kachinas that I could find because I just don’t think the photos I took did them justice.

The EIGHT images of Mora’s paintings that were reproduced in offset form are:

1. SHO-YÁNG-EP KÁTCHINA [Left-handed Katchina] (Soyangephoya)

2. HÉU-MISH KÁTCHINA (Hemis) This is the one I took, the link to the Adobe Gallery is broken.

3. TÉU-MAHS KÁTCHINA (Tumas or Crow Mother)

4. MU-SHÁISH KÁTCHINA [Buffalo] (Mosairu) 

5. POO-WHÁ-MUICH KÁTCHINA (Powamu) 

6. SÉE-PEEK-NICH (Sipikne)

7. HEU-MÍSH KÁTCHINA-MANA [Man] (Hemis Kachinmana) 

8. SHE-ÉU-HEU-MISH KÁTCHINA (Sio Hemis)

I’ll keep you posted on what I find out about acquiring a set of these. I hope they don’t cost this much!

And I need to call Marsha Davis at the Lamoille Gallery. She has a collection of kachinas and may not know about this exhibit. JOE please write a long comment about your dream about these please!

Did you ever see a little kid, usually a toddler, pick up a play phone (I guess those are now toy cellphones and yak away? Cute, right? Or is it? Do our toddler selves know something our adult selves don’t want to admit?

In Japan, Itaru Sasaki created a phone booth that has now become the go to place to talk to one’s dead relatives.

Last year in 2021, I finally found a Valentine mailbox on sale at Joanns. Mine is slightly different with a white trim but any mailbox will do.

I used it to put letters to my late aunt and cards for my late family members. You write like you would if they were alive or you buy a greeting card and put it in the box. You can also write a letter or buy a card and mail it to yourself but it’s addressed to your late relative or friend C/O yourself.

Think about all the stories you’ve ever read about sticking a note into a grave or a rock wall or a cave. In many countries in Asia, a drink is poured onto the ground so the dead can partake. It’s very important in many cultures to honor the dead – yeah, I was an anthropology major and did anthropological fieldwork but seriously “ancestor worship” as a term is just plain insulting. Ask any medium or spiritualist. I highly recommend Craig Hamilton-Parker’s YouTube channel and books and films. I also cannot say enough good things about Joshua P. Warren ,who isn’t a medium, but he works with them. Josh also builds devices to talk to the “other side”. but a simple mailbox is all you need.

I did not buy a flower for Julius Caesar’s grave in the Roman forum but I did honor the grave. At least in May 2003, people were STILL bringing gifts to the dead Roman emperor who on the Ides of March was stabbed to death by his closet associates and senators. There’s a wonderful blog post so you can visit virtually. The day I was there the grave was COVERED with gifts. Even after 2,000 years people still want to honor CAESAR! But are they also trying to talk to him?

I could keep adding examples of how people try to “honor” the dead but in reality, what they REALLY are doing is giving gifts to the dead and chatting with them. You see it all the time in cemetaries. But if your loved one is buried at sea, or cremated and the ashes were spread, or the grave is far far away or forgotten entirely, use a mailbox! Be creative. The “other side” is just a dimension. Most people who study thanatology will tell you that the dead can come and go at will. Most have no desire to come here but a lot do. If you really miss someone, don’t grieve, write out what you want to say, mail it, light a candle and sit at the table and chat over a meal – yes, that’s why a plate was always set aside for the a dead relative. I’m linking to an article about Poland but this custom shows up around the world.

https://culture.pl/en/article/why-do-poles-leave-one-chair-empty-on-christmas-eve

https://ampoleagle.com/the-empty-chair-at-the-wigilia-table-p15813-226.htm

And don’t forget the hungry ghosts or relatives that are missing a home cooking and a stiff drink!

https://www.sbs.com.au/food/article/2018/04/12/why-do-buddhists-honour-our-dead-feeding-them

Let me know in the comments if you post a letter and if you get a reply. Sometimes the reply will simply be peace of mind or the smell of a faint perfume or cigar!

This evening, on the Ides of March, while cooking T-Bone steaks I found marked down almost 40 percent at Albertsons, I looked over and spied a deck of cards Ryan was examining. Thinking he had bought himself an oracle deck I jumped out of my skin when he held up a card and asked its meaning. OMG, that can’t be, can it? A few cards later I was reeling. I loused up the boxed mashed potatoes (I hate using them but it was raining I didn’t get to the store.) while processing the fact that Ryan had found a deck of cards I had sworn I had thrown out.

“Why on earth would you throw out oracle cards, especially a deck your mom gave you”? Why indeed? PS several years ago I wanted to replace the deck and the cost was over $280. It’s come down. But still. It’s pricey.

The late Harry Leo Duran, MD., Ph.D., MPH had decided to convert to Eastern Orthodoxy after having converted from Roman Catholicism and Father Mark was coming for a visit. If Harry had found my 1985 Christmas present from my mother, he would have destroyed them the way the Taliban blew up the Twin Buddhas or the missionaries to Hawaii had destroyed shrines, or how Oliver Cromwell ordered the burning of books in 17th century England. Harry, you see was a fanatic!

I thought I had actually thrown the deck out rather than watch my bookcase next to my bed get toppled and everything torn up. While in San Benito, Texas I used to hide the latest Harry Potter book under my bed. Fearing they, too, would get torn to shreds, I gave the entire collection of first edition hardcovers to the library where I worked when I moved away. Broke my heart.

When I lived in El Paso, Texas, I worked with a 5th generation curandero. Living RIGHT on the border, it was hard not to take an interest in curanderismo. Harry flew into a rage because he felt that was a province of study that only HE should write about, but I created a huge bibliography, published it on the web, and wrote a conference paper that got accepted. In fact, I was the lead speaker on Alternative Medicine at the National Medical Library Association Conference in San Antonio, Texas in May 2005.

Which doesn’t make me an expert. BUT I can talk about SOUL RETRIEVAL and LIMPIAS and PLÁTICAS because tonight I got to experience a soul retrieval in my kitchen and well I’ve had a limpia and a plática done to me back in El Paso. In 2005, curanderismo was a word people asked me to SPELL (pun intended). “What is it? Never heard of it”.

So, what happened tonight? An oracle deck of cards reappeared along with another deck of cards I received at a Tibetan empowerment in New York City in 1997 (8 Heruka) and a card from a deck of flash cards one of my students had let me keep. At around 1:30 p.m. this afternoon, I was talking to the vet tech telling her about how I used to teach Prehistoric Rock Art and then at 6:45 pm., one of the student assignments shows up at the dining table.

THREE pieces of my soul were retrieved during dinner! If you watch all the fancy rituals that cost quite a lot of money to retrieve a piece or fragment or sliver of your soul that took off when you were traumatized or injured or abused or simply frightened, you will see how important it is to FIND all of the pieces of your soul that got lost over time.

BUT you don’t need to do a ritual if you live a truly MAGICAL life. The divine will do the ritual for you and if you are blessed with living with a conduit through which the divine can manifest healing, all the better. Ryan is a pure innocent who has found more than one soul fragment. I saved his life the night he was attacked by pit bulls in July 2021 and he saved mine in Las Vegas in November 2021 and tonight he found fragments I thought I’d never find. It’s like Humpty Dumpty. The soul shatters. In order to be a truly powerful healer or a successfully tax account for that matter, one needs to be whole. I’m getting there.

https://www.ritualcravt.com/platica-a-heart-to-heart-conversation-with-a-curandera/