Michael Gordon has been creating art on the street sides of Belize City for almost 3 decades. And today saw the start of that work being comprehensively catalogued.

The Michael Gordon Museum will consist of photos of his paintings - many of them done on cardboard - much like the one he was working on today - as well as 3D digital composites of his sculptures.

We asked the enigmatic Gordon how he felt about his future digital archive:

Michael Gordon, Artist
"I am only the artist but then who wants to build me up, it's like a step forward, which in it's true, like when you make one and it goes, you want a next one. So then it's just invincible. Because you have to do, your mind and your hands give you that run.You have no promise because the success is only what you make and every piece has to be successful because then that's your motive."

"I think I was here from '98, I started doing this but then one thing I couldn't get perfect was the shape of things. So I started with landscape. First to make me inspired is like "vanzana and straka" that's what I used to do out there at Prince [and] Albert. So I invented like through people's curve the next stage of perfection. Realistic. You don't have to put it identical, realistic. And that's the road I'm putting myself on. Cause I could do cartoon but I like to be realistic."

And Gordon's pieces can be found on cardboard, paper, canvas, wood panels, and other materials. He creates with whatever he gets his hands on and he says he holds himself to a certain standard.

Michael Gordon, Artist
"I do it for a living so the method just comes to the things I can create because if I can create something good, I win a stage of perfection. So I graded myself. So that's why I feel like as long as you can grade yourself to a height, you pass a stage."

Courtney Menzies:
"What inspires you to make this type of art?"

Michael Gordon, Artist
"This is living. This is my trade. I used to do it in primary school, but me as the only one, nobody to channel so I come out here and I see channel so I pick up their style and I do my style. So I get myself to the next stage of knowing money. That is something real serious, you have to know this game because if you don't know this game you're not going to make any game. You're going to be like game-less. And you can't be game-less to survive."

And his art is as mystifying as his answers, so we asked him to decipher the art piece he'd been working on:

Michael Gordon, Artist
"This is a piece that I got from Mary Anne, in an art book. This is a shipwreck, buccaneers. See it more here, trees. It's more like that. Shipwreck buccaneers, the ship blew up and then they got wreckage, sank, and then these things came up. But then what saved them, these things here are fire. You know when a ship goes down, the fire comes down, that's why they stay so far. This one breaks back, this one went so, this one is running away so because of the flames so I see Mona Lisa, I see Mary Anne, and this is a Mary Anne piece, Da Vinci. Da Vinci drew Mary Anne right. So I'm going on a journey, I don't know who will touch mines but I'm touching from Da Vinci to Mary Anne, then if I hit the book, it'll be to Michael Gordon."

But when it comes to the sculptures, made from zericote, mahogany, cedar, and logwood, the process of photogrammetry is facilitated by the Institute of Archeology. The director explained more about how it works.

Melissa Badillo, Director, Institute of Archeology
"This is a technique that we've been using to document artifacts from the Belize National Collection, usually Maya artifacts or colonial items that we have in our national collection. And the reason we've been using this is that we want to have a digital record or our artifacts. Over the years, we've usually been using paper documents to record all the details but as you all know that during the pandemic, about 5 years ago, we were kind of trapped in not being able to access materials, getting to offices, so one of the ways we could bypass that is having digital records available online that we can easily access information so the Institute of Archaeology embarked on a long term project to digitally document Belize's artifacts."

"Now we've partnered with the Image Factory looking at different ways we can still utilize that digital documentation and this is, I think, our third project that we've had with them documenting different items, in this case, some of the wooden sculptures from Mr Gordon. It takes maybe 200 or so photos that we capture and then those are stitched together to make a 3D model of the item."

Gordon's work will be available to the public - and particularly to students - on the 501Access website.

This project will result in a digital database, serving as the first step in creating a prospectus for the Michael Gordon Museum. The initial phase will take one year to complete.