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The Day of the Dead: A Visual Compendium
"The Mexican...is familiar with death, jokes about it, caresses it, sleeps with it, celebrates it; it is one of his favourite toys and his most steadfast love." Octavio Paz, El laberinto de la soledad , ( The Labyrinth of Solitude , 1961).
The Day of the Dead is a comprehensive, visual compilation of all forms of artistic material celebrating the world-famous annual Mexican festival. According to Mexican tradition, one day in the year belongs exclusively to the dead, a day on which they are granted celestial permission to visit friends and relatives on earth. In modern Mexico, festivities for the dead are idiosyncratic. Blending pre-Christian and Christian elements, celebrations for All Saints' and All Souls? are unique in the Catholic world. Mexicans are as tormented by the idea of mortality as other nations, yet they honour and receive the departed with good cheer, visual splendour and imagination. Families welcome the returning souls with flowers, incense, candles and special foods. This is not a sombre occasion, but a time of feasting and reunion.
This anthology considers how the Day of the Dead has been celebrated in visual art and culture, from the traditional and iconic illustrations of skulls and singing skeletons by seminal lithographer José Guadalupe Posada to the paper cuts of Aaron Velasco Pacheco and representations of the festival by Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo and in the folk art of the Linares family.
Curated by Julian Rothenstein and written by Chloë Sayer, an independent scholar and curator, specializing in Mexican art and culture, this is a must-have book for anyone interested in this extraordinary cultural event and its artistic representation.
The Day of the Dead is a comprehensive, visual compilation of all forms of artistic material celebrating the world-famous annual Mexican festival. According to Mexican tradition, one day in the year belongs exclusively to the dead, a day on which they are granted celestial permission to visit friends and relatives on earth. In modern Mexico, festivities for the dead are idiosyncratic. Blending pre-Christian and Christian elements, celebrations for All Saints' and All Souls? are unique in the Catholic world. Mexicans are as tormented by the idea of mortality as other nations, yet they honour and receive the departed with good cheer, visual splendour and imagination. Families welcome the returning souls with flowers, incense, candles and special foods. This is not a sombre occasion, but a time of feasting and reunion.
This anthology considers how the Day of the Dead has been celebrated in visual art and culture, from the traditional and iconic illustrations of skulls and singing skeletons by seminal lithographer José Guadalupe Posada to the paper cuts of Aaron Velasco Pacheco and representations of the festival by Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo and in the folk art of the Linares family.
Curated by Julian Rothenstein and written by Chloë Sayer, an independent scholar and curator, specializing in Mexican art and culture, this is a must-have book for anyone interested in this extraordinary cultural event and its artistic representation.
- GenresNonfictionArtHistory
224 pages, Hardcover
Published November 23, 2021
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54 people want to read
About the author
Chloe Sayer
27 books2 followersChloë Sayer has been researching Mexican traditions since 1973. She lectures for museums and art colleges, has organized numerous exhibitions, and has worked on several television documentaries. She has also made ethnographic collections for the British Museum.
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
February 6, 2022
This is such a great book that I read it two times the day I got it!
It's a simple book - portrayals of skeletons, skulls, catrinas, etc. in Mexican art. The book is about 220 pages and there are maybe 20 pages of the text in about 8 sections. The author knew how to write just enough to explain interesting background about Manuell Manilla, Jose Guadalupe Posada, Sergei Eisenstein, Frida Kahlo, Diego Rivera, and the Linares family and their various portrayals (along with some precolonial and colonial antecedents). The other 90% of the book is beautiful images of death with snippets of bilingual poetry. I bought the book because it has many of Posada's broadsides with the poems legible - that is worth the book alone! And I really enjoyed seeing all of this art and learning about the history of las catrinas and the different customs throughout Central Mexico.
It's a simple book - portrayals of skeletons, skulls, catrinas, etc. in Mexican art. The book is about 220 pages and there are maybe 20 pages of the text in about 8 sections. The author knew how to write just enough to explain interesting background about Manuell Manilla, Jose Guadalupe Posada, Sergei Eisenstein, Frida Kahlo, Diego Rivera, and the Linares family and their various portrayals (along with some precolonial and colonial antecedents). The other 90% of the book is beautiful images of death with snippets of bilingual poetry. I bought the book because it has many of Posada's broadsides with the poems legible - that is worth the book alone! And I really enjoyed seeing all of this art and learning about the history of las catrinas and the different customs throughout Central Mexico.
November 5, 2023
A wonderfully research compendium of one of my favorite holidays. Sayer has the history, myth, and the story behind some of the best known DDLM artists. A really good, easy, read with wonderfully shown photographs and paintings.
November 3, 2025
This is a beautiful compendium. I learned a lot about the artistic as well as historical significance of Days of the Dead.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews