Born and bred in Mexico, one of the authors (Aaron Sulkes), an oncologist, resident in Israel for many years, returned for a sabbatical. A keen amateur photographer, he saw Mexico with a fresh eye.
Death is our constant diet in oncology and palliative care. We struggle in dealing with death. We talk and talk but its comprehension remains opaque. We only ever get so far, in describing the particular horror of one death, and then the same story disguised, represents itself time and again. And we wait for our own death, each time minutely better prepared, each of us influenced by our chosen or ambient culture.
Given that we are creatures of the imagination, we use symbols, such as language, music, and pictures. Each society has its way of symbolizing and integrating loss.
These remarkable photographs (Figs. 1 and 2) were snapped in Mexico during the annual national festival of The Day of the Dead (Dia de los Muertos). This holiday—which is a time to remember and to pray for dead family and friends—is a syncretism between Catholicism (All Saints' Day on November 1 and All Souls' Day on November 2) and pre-Hispanic indigenous customs, possibly of the Aztecs. Traditionally November 1 honors children and infants, whereas deceased adults are remembered on November 2.
Fig. 1.
Fig. 2.
The photographs are of dolls and paintings that are found all over the country. Naïve representations of death, painted with vivid colors and gruesome masks, often depict a skeleton as if it were smiling. Sulkes observed said that the picnicking in the cemeteries would go on into the small hours of the morning, tables laden with food and candles for light; with children running unconcernedly around the graves and their ghosts. There is special bread baked for the day—Pan de Muerto—the Bread of the Dead. The colors together with the joyous feasting cry out for the celebration of life despite the presence of death.
One can guess by extrapolation that in some way this celebration of the Day of the Dead soothes the fevered mind that seeks to understand the incomprehensibility of being born, of living and loving, and yet of being doomed to die. Nonexistence is incomprehensible cognitively, therefore emotionally we appreciate the symbols, the company of friends and family, and fine food.
Other cultures study holy texts; others bloody themselves with knives; others have dawn ceremonies at the cenotaph; others visit graves and somberly place stones or flowers; yet others dress in black for ever after.
The spectacular bright colors of the Mexican Day of the Dead are a vibrant reminder that life defeats death.
