Huichol MythoIo~y ad Cuhre. part 1.World’s Largest Yarn PdxItfssg k Latest in

Series of ISI-Cosurnskdmsed Artworks

1 JNumber28 july13,1981

Last year I told you about the psyche-delic art of the Huichol Indians. 1 Thatessay included some color reproduc-tions of a few small yam paintings, aswell as a photograph of our newbuilding. Then a few months ago, I toldyou about two murals we had comrnis-sioned.z Shortly afterwards, we installeda third mural. It is in fact an 8’ x 12’(243.84cm x 365.76cm) mural-sizedHuichol yam painting—the largest everexecuted. ISP’s new yam painting isalso atypical because Huichol paintingsare normally executed by men. The art-ist who executed “The History, Gods,Myths, Rituals, and Future of theHuichol Indians” is a woman—EmeteriaMartinez Rios.

Previously, the largest yam paintingshad been two 8’ x 4’ (243.84cm x121 .92cm) panels in my personal collec-tion. The size of the Huichol yam paint-ing has traditionally been limited by thesize of the available plywood panels. SoI suggested to Bob and Olga Brooks, theimporters from whom I purchase myHuichol art, that this size restrictioncould be overcome by combining three8’ x 4’ panels into one 8’ x 12’ triptych.They arranged this on a visit to Tepic, inthe Mexican state of Nayarit. The muralsummarizes much of the basic Huichol

mythology, much as I asked the artist todo. It is not immediately apparent that itis in fact 12 separate yam paintings.This is shown by a special sketch (whichappears in the color insert) that gives

the outline of each painting. The 12stories cover the gods of Fire, theMoon, the Sun, Corn, and Water, aswell as the Flood myth, the Earth myth,the Fiesta of Squash and Corn, theFiesta of the Drum, the peyote pilgrima-ge, rituals surrounding the planting ofcorn, and the future of the Huichol peo-ple as seen by the artist.

For those of you who have not readthe earlier essay, the Huichol Indiansare a community of some ten- to twelve-thousand people, who live scatteredamong the southern mountains of Mex-ico’s Sierra Madre Occidental RangesKnown to themselves as the Wixarika,the Huichols are thought by some to bethe descendants of the Toitecs and theAztecs;’t others believe they are linkedwith the coastal tribes of Nayarit, andhad settled in the Sierra long before theAztecs had entered the valley of Mex-ice. s In either case, the strength of theirpre-Columbian culture and religion hasresisted centuries of outside influences.iIn fact, anthropologist Peter T. Furst,quoted in Portfolio, calls the Huichols“the only sizable population in Meso-america whose indigenous religious uni-verse has remained basically unalteredby the influence of Chnstianity.”b

One wonders how long Huicholcukure or traditions can be preserved,considering that the Huichols have nowritten language. The culture is pre-served in oral traditions only, passedfrom one generation to the next. If the

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language dies, the Huichoks, somethink, may also die. Whale everylanguage changes eventually, Huichol,in spite of its contact with Spanish, isstill spoken daily. And to date, thetraditions seem to be maintained in spiteof economic and other pressures.

Helping to preserve the memory of avanishing way of Iiie is one of thereasons I am so proud that 1S1 has com-missioned the yam painting by Rios.This yam painting, which forsimplicity’s sake I will refer to as“Huichol Mythology,” was executedespecially at my request. As a matter offact, I selected its theme and recom-mended the use of the dark back-ground. One of my favorite Huicholpaintings uses this combination. I knewof course that the rest would be ex-ecuted in varied, bright colors such asorange. Several views of the new paint-ing can be found in the color insert inthis issue. I hope you will save it as asouvenir from 1S1.

Yam painting is a relatively recent in-novation of the Huichol culture, but thetechniques employed to create thepaintings are as old as the Huicholsthemselves.b These d~tinctive yampaintings are created by pressing strandsof brightly-colored yam into warmbeeswax spread on a plywood panel.This form of art was born in 1965, whenFurst persuaded a Huichol artisan toportray his cultural heritage in a nar-rative form, using techniques that hadpreviously been used only in the cre-ation of devotional items such asnien”kas.b A nien”ka is a “god’s face,” abridge to the supernatural reahn of theHuichol gods and ancestors that allowsthe shaman (or mam bkame) to peer in-to that reahn and view the very fabric ofreality. A nien”ka generally is small,disk-shaped, and made of wood orgourd. Symbols and designs of powerare imposed on the nierika by adheringstrands of yam to its surface .4.6

The nien”ka itself has been trans-formed by the art it gave birth to. No

longer just an artifact or powerfultalisman, a representation of it hascome to be included in many of thereligious Huichol yam paintings-whichare generally not intended for sde to thepubfic-as a symbol of the passagewaythat a true nien”ka opens. Anothercharacteristic of Huichol yarn paintingsis their proclivity for extremely bright,contrasting colors. Combined with theHuichol penchant for ignoring Westernnotions of perspective, Huichol paint-ings often look like drug-induced vi-sions. As a matter of fact, that is oftenjust what they are.

One of the best-known and most-studied of the Huichol rituals involvesthe use of peyote, a cactus containing,among other things, the hallucinogenicdrug mescaline. Peyote grows in theWirikuta desert some 300 miles north-east of the Huichol homeland in theSierra Madre. A yearly pilgrimage toWirikuta, considered by the Huichols tobe their spiritual land of origin, is theclimax of Huichol religious Me. Peyoteis eaten with great ceremony duringspecific fiestas, to enable the Huichofa

to communicate directly with their

gods. Peyote-induced visions frequently

provide the ideas and motifs of Huichol

artwork, and on the reverse side of

every Huichol painting the artist writes

in Spanish hw, or occasionally her,mystical interpretation of the image.

In keeping with this tradition, Rioswrote extensive notes on the reverseside of the giant yarn painting she exe-cuted for 1S1. A translation of her com-ments was prepared by Olga VasquezBrooks. In a preface to the translation,Olga remarked:

[Rios] has combined the super-natural with the profane so gracefullythat they are indktinguishable in tbepainting. It depicts the magical worldof the Huichol in which everything ispossible. It exemplifies their perce~tion of being equal with their gods,and being in harmony with their uni-verse. And, although the artist haschosen to locate the gods at the top of

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-. - ... .. ... .the painting, it by no means indicates

that a Huichol considers hiiself sub-servient to them, or that the godsreside in the heavens. They are con-sidered to exist at all levels of nature,and the Huichols evoke and consultthem for all of their feasts. In fact,there is no word for ‘god’ in theHuichol language. The names of thegods are all terms of kinship. ‘God’ isa corruption introduced by the use ofthe Spanish language.3

One of the ceremonies in which theHuichols attain total union with theirgods, and with a primordial timewhen the gods undertook the fhst tripto Winkuta, is in the peyote pilgrisn-age. In a calihuey [temple], beforedeparting on the journey, themara ‘akame [shaman] recounts thebirth of fire, the moon, and the sun.The upper portion of the paintingbegins with the creation myths ofthese divinities.

What follows is a translated, annotat-ed, and edited version of the artist’s in-terpretation of her painting. Keep inmind that it is not always possible to ex-plain the paintings in a completely“logical” fashion, nor are the explana-tions themselves always logical.T

133a ruture essay, 1 wtfl cuscuss ““in meGarden,” a mural by Jennifer Bartlett,and “Interpenetrations,” an abstract oifpainting by the Welsh artist, HandelEvans. In the next part of thk essay, Iplan to tell you more about the HuicholIndians themselves. But in closing thisdescription and introduction to“Huichol Mythology,” I must expressthe joy which this work brings to meand to all who see it daily at 1S1. It iswith the deepest sincerity that I say youare alf cordially invited to visit 1S1 to ex-perience this magnificent work person-ally. While we take great pride in thework we do at 1S1, a visit to ISI’sbuilding can also be a rewarding artisticexperience. Ranging from this primitiveexpression of the concern of a Huicholwoman for the future of her people tothe modem sophistication of artists likeJennifer Bartlett and Handel Evans, thehumor and warmth of Bill Graniz.o, andthe power of Joseph Slawinski, it is anexperience you will not soon forget.

*****

My thanks to Stephen Bonaduce for

his help in the prepamtion of this essay.01981(s1

REFERENCES

1. Gmfts+kfE. The psychedelic srt of the Huichol Indmns. Current Conkvm (52):5-7, 24-31 December 1979.2, . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Fine art enhances ISJ’s new buifding. Current Contenrs (5):S-9, 2 February 1981.3. Brooks O V. Telephone communication. 10 June 1981.4. Berrb K, ed, Art of /he Huicho[ Indians. New York: Hany N, Abrams, 1918, 212 p.5. Negrhs J. The Huichol Indians. UNESCO Coun”er (2): 16-17; 2>7, Februasy 1979.6. StrebefSh F. Sacred colors of the Huichol. Portfolio 1:5fA4, 1979.7. Brnoks 0 V. Personal communication. 7 February 1981.

I

Ffgure 1: Interpretation of Huichol yampainting. Numbers correspond to areasin the painting. Discussion in quotationsby Emetena Martinez Rios. Most of thebracketed elaboration was contributedby Olga Vasquez Brooks. (See schemat-ic in accompanying insert. )

The Fire God

1. “The Fire God was born out of alight that Our Mother the Earth, Tatei

Urianaka, gave off as she tried to raiseherself through the five levels of theunderworld. On the highest level thislight was seen as a small fire. It wasTatewan, Our Grandfather Fire [whomthe Huichols call Tail. He suddenlysprang on a deer that was dazzled by thelight, hung him on a spit, and got underhim to cook him. From the drippings,Tatewan acquired the shape of a manwith a blaze for a heart. The animals

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were encouraged by the wind god tohunt him down. When he was shot, hefell down as an old man. Then TamatzKayuman, the Blue Deer, sent for him.[Kayumari, the Elder Brother Deerspirit , is omniscient. Knowing allthoughts and prayers, and everythingthat happens, he is present over alf the

earth.b The deer is the most sacredanimal in the Huichol pantheon.4] But

[the fire] would not come back to Iiieuntil the specfled votive offerings oflogs had been made for him. When thiswas done, two other deer helped him upand immediately a large fire wasformed.” [The large arrow to the rightof the fme symbolizes the gift of fire thatTai gave to man. The bottom of the sec-tion shows the pilgrims evoking Tai forguidance and protection during thepeyote pilgrirnage.7]

The BfrtlI of the Moon

2. “While the fire was still being pretected by the deer, an old bfind womantripped and fell into it. No sooner hadher body turned to ashes when the deerfelt something move over the east, andthe sickle shape of the moon appeared.Five times it moved, growing progres-sively fuller, untif it reached fuU size.And thus the moon was born, and is pic-tured here next to the Fire God.” [Insome parts of the Sierra it is believedthat when the old woman lived on theearth, she ate people. Today if a child isborn without a limb, the Huichols at-tribute this to Takutzi Me’kima Emena’shaving eaten it.T]

How the Sun Was Born

3. “Tamatz Kayumari, the Blue Deer,overseeing the development of light onearth, was not pleased with the amountof light given off by the moon. Heordered several children to be throwninto the fire as a sacrifice. But toeveryone’s surprise, when the first fourwere thrown in, birds came flying out of

the twe. in tlu.s way the earth was

populated with birds. Then a sicklychild affhcted with many diseases waschosen. At first he refused to besacrificed untif certain votive objectswere offered: prayer arrows adornedwith a pair of sandals [which serve toguide the feet and prevent them fromstumbliig on the trai14], a nien”ka

[“god’s face”; a disk decorated withsymbolic figuresG], and eagle feathers.After this was complied with, hejumped into the free, creating a whirl-wind of sparks out of the diseases he’dhad, and aU those sitting around the firebecame afflicted with them. In this way,the sun was born.” [There are many ver-sions of this story. In one, the boy whobecomes the sun is a lame child who wasthrown into a black pit.7 In others, aboy who is lame and unerringly accuratewith a bow and arrow is convinced toimmolate himself.b The trait that mostversions seem to have in common is thatthe voluntary self-sactilce of a youngboy was necessary for the sun to beborn.]

The Goddess of corn

4. [The fourth deity with whom theHuichols are in constant contact is thecom goddess, seen here in a cafihuey,

or temple. For the com fiesta, thecalih uey is decorated with flowers andcom products. T] “It is told that one timea young man went out in search of food.He met some ants along the way who in-vited him to search for corn, but thatvery night [while he slept], they walkedoff with his hair and eyelashes. This lefthim blind, and he couldn’t continue his~earch until he heard the song of a dovethat led him to the house of the comgoddess, Our Mother Kukuruku. Thegoddess introduced him to the fivedifferent-colored daughters who sym-bolize the different colors of the comthat Huichols have. He selected theblack one to take home as his wife. He

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was warned by the goddess that shemust be placed in the caiihuey for fivedays and not be allowed to work. Butthe mother-in-law became impatientand shamed the girl into grinding com.She immediately began to bleed. Assoon as that happened, the com wasdiminished and the young man went outagain to ask for more corn. Thk time hewas given five ears of corn that heplanted with the utmost of ceremony, asprescribed by the com goddess.” [Tothis day, the Huichol farmer selects apart of his milpa, or cornfield, to plantthe seeds from those first five ears ofcom that have been passed down fromgeneration to generation .7]

The Water Goddess

5. [The Water Goddess, Aramara, isseen here with two com plants. It is saidthat the Huichols travel far to obtain ho-ly water to ceremonially bless their complots and votive offerings. It is believedthat Aramara lives near the coast, and itis to her that the Huichols pray for rainand clouds for their com.T]

The Flood Myth

6. [The myth of the Flood and thebeginning of the Huichol people isdepicted in the next scene. Nakaw6, theEarth Mother, is shown with lightningrays extending out like protective arms,symbolic of her guardian role over thisperiod of Huichol mythical history.T]“Wata’kame, a hard-working man[Clearer of the Fields, survivor of theFlood and devastation, and founder ofthe Huichol people and their way oflife4], tries to clear a plot of land, butfinds that each day on his return thetrees have grown back again. On thefourth day, he stays behind anddkcovers at dawn an old woman, whoraises her cane to the four cardinaldirections and causes the trees to grow.

Wata’kame attempts to kill her, but shewarns him of the impending Flood, and

of the actions he must take in order tosave himself.

“He is instructed to make a canoe, tocollect seeds and votive offerings, andto fmd a black female dog. On the fifthday [following her warning], she ap-pears to bid him farewell. As he setssail, he hears the screams of his fellowcountrymen as they are eaten by theirutensils, which have been transformedinto wild animals. He sails to the west.to the east, to the north, and finally tothe south. He is ordered to stop anddisembark at Rapavillemeta. Nakaw#tells him to walk in the four dhections,plant the seeds, offer the votive objectsin her name, and to build a home.

“As W ata’kame begins his workagain, he finds that his food is ready forhim on his return each day. He decidesto return early one day to see who is do-ing this, and discovers that the littleblack dog sheds her fur, hangs it up, andgoes off to the river to bathe in the bodyof a woman. He tosses the fur into thefire and immediately hears the yelpingof the dog. He rushes to bathe her withground com juice, and gives her thename Tashlwa. From the union ofWata’kame and Tashlwa, the earth be-came populated once more. ”

Mother Earth

7. [In the upper right portion of thepainting, the artist shows the story ofhow Tamatz Kayumari, the Blue Deer,dkcovered the Mexican Mother

Earth.’~l “It was a land he [TamatzKayumari] had set aside for the godsand goddesses, and he was trying to gainaccess to it by shooting arrows into it.Each of the first four arrows he shot

failed to attach to the mark, but fell andbecame [respectively] a palm tree, agrove of trees, a stack of coconuts, anda pile of sand and rocks. ThenKayumari dreamt that he had shot afifth arrow smeared with his own blood.The arrow and its trajectory then turned

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into a road and he was able to connectthe two worlds. The gods then crossed

over to this world, but when thesuncame up the next day they were burnedand became invisible. ”

[ThB road is symbolized by the round,yellow nien”ka, the passage from oneworld to the next. The nierika containsafl the votive objects that Kayumanordered to be used as offerings to sup-plicate the gods. Today, these offeringsare often smeared with the blood of adeer to symbolically represent the sacr-ifice that Tamatz Kayuman made.T]

The Ffesta of Squash and Corn

8. [The middle strip of the paintingshows three of the fiestas that theHuichols celebrate during the year.They average a fiesta a month, andthese usually last two to three days andnights. The participants sleep little anddrink a lot. An animal is always sacri-ficed, but because deer are now scarce abull is often used.

[The beginning of the middle stripstarts with the first fiesta-the fiesta ofcalabasa” and e[ote, that is, squash andmaize. It is the fmt fiesta of the yearand comes at the end of the rainy sea-son. The fmt thing shown is a calihueyfdled with offerings. A deer has beenhunted with the greatest solemnity andhas been brought into the village with allthe honor that would be bestowed on aspecial guest. The women offer itminiature tortillas and tamales as welf aspieces of cheese and gourds filled withtequino, a fermented com liquor.

[Around the orange object in thepainting, they have gathered to pray tothe gods to accept their offerings. Thepower of their prayers is symbolicallyrepresented by the arrow and its trajec-tory, which have gone through thenierika, a symbol of the passageway toanother world. To the Huichols, an ar-row symbolizes a message. The blood ofthe deer is sprinkled on the votive ob-

jects and on the participants. Themara ‘akame also dips his mu vien”es, orhls ceremonial accoutrements, into thedeer’s blood to augment his power withthat of the greatest shaman, TamatzKayumari, the Blue Deer.T]

Fiesta of the Drum

9. [The second fiesta is the fiesta of thetambom, or drum. All of the children ofthe host of the fiesta must sit in the sunfor a fuU day and shake a rattle. Themarried daughters of the host oftencome from far off to take part in thefiesta. During the ceremony, theshaman chants the entire peyote pil-grimage to Wirikuta that someday thechildren are expected to make. Heguides their spirits to all the shrinesalong the way, describes them in detail,and fuUy explains the rituals that musttake place at each stop. He thus createsa pattern in their memories that theywill never forget. At the top, the scenealso shows an animal being sacrificed,and the lines from it to the gods and tothe calihuey at the right represent theHuichols’s prayers being received. Thescene also shows musicians who playduring the ceremonies.7]

Peyote Pffgrfmage

10. [The third fiesta, or ceremony, inthe middle strip is the peyote pilgrimageitseff. Here the women bid the men fare-well from the patio of the calihuey. Thecandles they are holding represent theillumination that everyone, includingeven those who wilf stay behind, willreceive. The distance between thepeyoteros and those left behind iserased by the spiritual communion be-tween the two.

[The peyoteros leave behind a cordtied in knots, which represent thevarious stops they wilf make. The firststop is where the participants cleansethemselves of their sins by the power ofTatewari, Our Grandfather Fire. It is a

critical stop and the success of thejourney will be determined by how theyconduct this ceremony.

[Each member steps forward one at atime and confesses his sexual transgres-sions. The women at home do the samething at the same time. The leadingmam’akame, or Tatewan, as he is calledduring the trip, records each sin by tyinga knot in a cord. When aU have con-fessed, the cord is tossed into the fire tosymbolically cleanse the sins, and theFire God is asked for protection for theremainder of the trip. This is the man-ner in which the Huichols reenact thefust peyote hunt done by the gods, and

and tamales, which is a corn foodprepared in corn husks. The farmerthen selects a portion of the plot, wherehe plants the sacred seeds that havebeen passed down to him, and he treatsthis section of ground from then on as ifit were an altar. The Huichols believethat it is the corn goddess herself who isplanted.

[When the young plants sprout, thernam ‘akatne is again called to conductanother ceremony. After this, the farm-er stays home and lets nature take itscourse, relying on the rain to sustain hiscorn. He comes back after the rainyseason to cut some of the sweet young

each- pilgrim takes the name of one of I ears of corn, but he cannot eat them un-the gods. The mounds along the feet of til a fiesta has been given in honor of thethe pilgrims in the painting representthe sacred places where the party willstop for the night to make offerings ontheir way to Wirikuta.

[If all the ceremonial thoughts and ac-tions have been complied with as man-

com goddess.[Several days in advance of this final

fiesta, the women begin the prepara-tions. They boil ground com sprouts tomake tequino, and make large quan-tities of tamales for guests. During the

dated by the gods, then the peyote I ceremony, the mam ‘akame gives thanks(which is thought to spring from the and offers to the goddess the fruits oftracks of Tamatz Kayuman, the Blue I the host’s labors. The guests and most ofDeer) will allow itself to be found. In the the family members eat and drink forpainting, the peyote is seen as a deeradorned with nien”kas, which representthe passage into the other world madepossible onfy through the hallucinoge-nic power of the peyote. The double-headed eagle who reigns over the upperworld is seen here watching over the en-tire ceremony .7]

corn Fbsas and Ritumb

11. [The bottom strip is mainly con-cerned with the Huichols’s daily preoc-cupation with corn. The annual plantingof com is imbued with ritual and cere-mony. A Huichol farmer is shown in thebottom left of the painting asking amam ‘akame to sanctify the plot of landhe has found among the ravines. Themamakame uses deer blood and holywater brought back from a farawaysacred place. He offers the gods tequino

several days to the beat of drums andthe chants of the mam akame.7]

The Future

12. [Possibly the most ominous aspectof the entire painting is in the lowerright-hand comer. Here the artist ex-presses a thought that has been in themind of every Huichol since the time ofthe conquistadors: the end of their wayof life. Rios gives her culture twentymore years before thk scene takesplace. She sees wise old men lamentingthat there are no young men left to passon their knowledge to, or to host thenecessary fiestas to appease the gods.They have all left the Sierra to work onthe coast or in the United States. Shedoes include a ray of hope, however:she depicts the splitting of the earth intofour parts, symbolizing a rebirth.T]

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