Interview with Lala Drona’s mother

Interview taken place December 17th, 2012 at 12:00PM Mountain time, in the home of Lala Drona’s mother.  She requests her name remain anonymous.

Q: Are you still in contact with Lala?

A: Yes,I am.

Lala (right) with brother (unidentified).

Q:  Lala is quite the character.  How did you raise her?

 A:  I let her think for herself and make her own decisions, with a lot of love and support.  Family for me is very important, and I taught Lala to hold these values close to her.  Our family is small, but it is strong.  Friends and other artists have made up her extended family.  She would do anything for them.

Q:What was Lala like as a child?

A:  She told stories all the time as a child, and I let her.  I remember her performing surgeries on Barbies because she wanted to be a doctor for a while.  At about 3 ½  years old, she had already decided that painting was her favorite thing to do.  She was very creative and had her own mind.  I remember watching her begin to paint outside the lines of her coloring book and telling her to stay in the lines.  She responded, “Mom, I’ve known for a long time now that I am supposed to stay in the lines.”  And even today she continues to color outside the lines.

Q: As a teen?

A:  It seemed like she was always sort of…some kind of counselor to her friends.  She loved helping people in trouble.  As a teen, she was a teen she was always a leader.  She never really had a best friend, but would go in on two best friends instead, to keep her independence I presumed.  She went in and out of depressions, as every angsty teen does.

Q:  Did she ever get in trouble?

A:  Yes, she got in a bit of trouble here and there.  One time, when she was about 13 years old, she stole some hard alcohol with a friend, and drank entirely too much, landing her in the emergency room.  But that is Lala, always having to experience for herself.  I recall another time when a neighbor caught her garage shopping for beers when she was about 15 years old.  (Garage shopping is driving around the neighborhood with friends and looking for open garages so that someone can walk in and steal some beers.)  I ‘m pretty sure she is very embarrassed about it now…shhhh (she laughs)

Lala Drona (left) (Halloween, 1995)

Q:  And friends?  Did she have a lot?

A: She had really bizarre friends, the kind you find on the streets it seemed like.  Sometimes dirty, crazy colored hair, but they were all good people as far I could see.  Everyone looked at them weird, but I understood them to be artists.  Misfits, that didn’t want to pretend they were just like everyone else.  They expressed themselves in their own way, and that way, no one expected them to act like everyone else.  Which I’m sure was liberating.

Q: And her father?  We didn’t find much about him.

A: He was a good father to her.

Q: Why does Lala move around so much?

A:  Because she is a butterfly.  Ella es una mariposa.  She is looking for a secret to take from and give to humanity.  She wants to find her art in other people…different cultures.  She always said it was funny that she just expresses and displays other people, their experiences, and they call it art.

Q: Do you have a good  relationship with Lala?

A: Yes.  Lala Drona and I are very close.  She has always opened her heart to me and has always supported and helped me.  However, sometimes she is a bit headstrong with her ideas, which can be difficult to deal with in relationships, but that is also what makes her great as an artist.  Her belief in her vision.  Either way, she always means well.

Photo Lala’s mother gave us from about 2 years ago.

Q: Is it hard for you to live so far away.

A: She is my friend.  It breaks my heart, but caged butterflies do not live very long, so I let her go with a smile.

Q:  If you could pick three words to describe your daughter, what would they be?

A: Creative, gutsy, sensitive.

Q: And everyone is dying to know.  What does Lala have mind for her next project?  Why is she tagging neighborhoods in Paris?

A: Now, that, I can’t say.  You have to wait and see.  But I can tell you one thing.  It is a long term project.  Patience is key.

Based on a fact.

Interview by Alice Thornton, L.D. Times.