Día de Muertos in Aguascalientes

A couple of volunteers decided to meet up this last weekend in Aguascalientes to take in their Festival de Calaveras. It is a celebration of the Day of the Dead, or Día de Muertos, which occurs on the evening of November 1 every year (All Saints Day). November 2, the following day, is always a national holiday in México, regardless of what day of the week it falls on, so this year we were lucky and had a 3-day weekend.

A calavera is the head of a catrina, and both are skeleton images that are widely celebrated now in México. The catrina was created by Méxican artist Jorge Guadalupe Posada--born in Aguascalientes. A famous image of a catrina is here.



The festival included a ton of activities, including bands, a county-fair, theater, and a parade. Here is a picture of some people painted as calaveras and wearing traditional costumes. They were pulling people from the crowd to dance on stage.