Made In Southeast Texas
by Julia Rodriquez
Caitie Lightfoot, aka @thearfterlifeart, creates macabre art from the remains of woodland creatures whose lives were ended naturally, their bones found on afternoon walks, or by hunters, whose bones are casualties for taxidermists, useless on a wall. Having access to bones as a child, Caitie began painting designs on the skulls, bringing new color and life into them. Around the age of 11 or 13, she kept the decoration of the bones a secret, for fear of being cast as weird by others. But as she grew as an artist, from working at Painting with a Twist, and making friends at The Art Studio (Ayyyy), she became more confident with showing her “weird” art with more and more people.
She started opening up commissions in 2016 and quickly found people who were interested in her painted skulls. But, a slight hiccup of her business is that shipping remains, to some states and out of the country, illegal; something she didn’t realize at the beginning of her business.
In the last few years, she’s begun to experiment beyond painting and rearranging the pieces into skeletons of impossible alien creatures. The first of these experiments was to put a cow skull and pelvis bone together and recently she’s stacked skulls of small creatures to adorn the heads of larger animals like a crown and incorporated bugs and dried flowers into works as well.
When looking back at how her business has evolved, she wishes she had started making art sooner. If she were to leave anyone any advice it would be to not let anyone, including yourself, get in the way of following something that interests you. Because “fancy people want dead things on their walls too.”
