Art is the Solution

A Jig Beyond the Grave Source: Museum of Modern Art Today is the last day of Mexico’s famed Day of the Dead festival, and, to celebrate, I want to share a rather wonderful print by Mexican illustrator José-Guadalupe Posada. Although The Day of the Dead has only recently become well-known in American pop-culture (and is drastically misunderstood), it is in fact an ancient festival with roots in pre-Columbian Mesoamerican cultures. The iconography surrounding the festival is similarly well-established. However, there are few artists who have had a bigger impact on how we see the Day of the Dead than José-Guadalupe Posada. Posada was primarily an illustrator, creating over twenty thousand drawings and lithographs for pamphlets and books. However, he returned to one theme over and over again: calaveras . Calaveras are decorative skulls that are often used to celebrate the Day of the Dead. Posada included them in much of his work, using them as a means to express cultural and political cri...