5 pieces to an All Souls Day Parade

by nate byerley and annie holub Catalyst

Send comments to: catalyst@wildcat.arizona.edu

Wildcat File Photo Arizona Daily Wildcat Matt Patane, one of the six members of Flam Chen, practices with a member of the spirit group for their performance in Saturday's All Soul's Day Parade. Eat the fire! Eat it!

Apparently, his skull head didn't have taillights.

Last year's parade was a word of mouth, somewhat spontaneous, event that drew artists from the Tucson community who made things like skull heads and cow masks in celebration of All Souls Day. Only it was so big and spur of the moment that the cops had to intervene.

"I don't know how many people we had last year, but it was enough people that we were flanked by motorcycle cops and they were like 'no no no,'" said Nadia Hagen, the informal coordinator of this year's parade. "We had a route figured out and they said 'If you guys go on the street, the first person that steps foot on the street gets arrested.'"

So the paraders opted to continue their trek on the sidewalks of downtown and Fourth Avenue. "It was really hard for a lot of people. They spent a lot of time and effort putting together these amazing, beautiful floats," said Hagen. "Like the horns that were sticking out of Matt Marcus's cow skull, they kept hitting the trees and hitting the buildings. It was too wide.

"So, knowing what happened last year, and knowing what an awesome thing this is for us to do every year together, I know we all want it to get bigger and cooler but it's like, well, we're going to have to have the street. And if we want to have the street, somebody is going have to go kiss the city butt. So I guess that's me," Hagen explained.

Wildcat File Photo Arizona Daily Wildcat Bride McNamara (left) and groom Pia Mogollón, members of the Spirit Group, pray before a rehearsal of the All Souls Day Parade. In a symbolic gesture of death, the bride and groom will be devoured by a dragon. Yum.

"I expected working with the city to be really difficult," said Hagen. "And they've been so easy to work with: Every time I call them they call me back, they have all the details, they have everything together, they were totally nice to us and they were like, 'Cool, I want to go!'

"We have some people sitting on City Council right now who are more interested in having the city be alive and having cooler events," explained Hagen.

McNamara said they received about $2,000 in grants and a parade permit. The city is barricading the streets and the parade, which will start at 8:30 p.m. Saturday at the Zenith Center (330 E. Seventh St.), is in conjunction with Downtown Saturday Night.

So, hopefully, there will be no need for the skull heads to have taillights.

The All Soul's Day Parade began about five years ago, Hagen estimates, when Tucson artist Susan Johnson's father passed away. "She wanted to find a way to honor his death in a way that really meant something to her," said Hagen. "So she pulled together all these groups of artists."

Everyone involved in the inner-workings of the parade have been there, off and on, creating things like mobile skeletons, masks, dragons, puppets and an array of animal skulls.

Marcus, for example, is building a cow skull on an adult tricycle, as well as a "car with a big altar on it," and a coffin cart for the bride and groom, the central characters of the processional. "I'm trying to pump out as many things on wheels as I can," he exclaimed.

Steve Eye's skull head this year is "more reptilian," he said. "The reptilian energies are coming out."

"Some years people have the time and effort to put into it," said Hagen, "And some years you have other shit going on in your life and you can't, but at least there's enough people it seems...so it always feels different, it always looks different," she continued.

"But this is definitely the biggest one, so far - this is monstrous, rather frightening. I think we'll have two, possibly three dragons."

Hagen stepped in as the "informal coordinator" a couple years ago. "I've stuffed myself into the position of the person who knew who had the duct tape," Hagen said. But basically, it's a free-for-all artistic and creative celebration, using the imagery of Dâa De Los Muertos as inspiration.

Even BICAS donated bike parts to help build floats.

"It's supposed to be a chance for anyone who wants to participate to be in it. Anyone can come and join in," said Marcus.

All Souls Day is "the holiday when you get to be an artist and it's OK to be a weirdo," Marcus said, talking about the way art is incorporated into the traditions of All Souls Day as well as El Dâa de los Muertos, the Day of the Dead. Both holidays have roots in the pagan rituals of Samhain [pronounced SAW-wain], tracing their heritage through Spanish colonialization and the influence of Catholicism.

The focus of the processional begins with "spirit people that are wandering through the streets of Tucson - they've come to welcome the bride and groom into Tucson," said McNamara, a local artist who is working with the dancers. The Spirit Group, guiding the bride and groom, will wind their way to the Ronstadt Center, where the bride and groom will get eaten by a dragon. That's the "transitional element, [the] go-between of worlds," said McNamara. It's the "moment when symbolic death takes place."

Wildcat File Photo Arizona Daily Wildcat Pia Mogollón, a member of the spirit group, joins the other members in a prayer before the start of rehearsal Tuesday.

McNamara described his work with the Spirit Group as being "very non-dancerly, and is very focused ... an embodiment of consciousness.

"Mostly what I've been trying to do with the group is give them a means for ritualizing ... having them come up with images to carry through the procession so the experience could have more meaning in celebration, in memory of those who've gone before us," said McNamara, embodying the basic meaning behind All Souls Day.

The parade, as Steve Eye outlined, is composed of several parts: the dancers, the artists, the puppets and the fire.

Jack "Straw," and Dennis "the Red" of Tucson's Puppet Productions were laboring in their workshop earlier this week with chicken wire, papier-machÚeacute; and paint, creating larger than life puppets for the parade.

"Right now," said Straw, "Dennis is working on a dragon-pillar." A dragon-pillar being, of course, a cross between a dragon and a caterpillar. "There will be five to six people inside of it," he added. "It's just not difficult to get Tucsonans to put on weird masks and run around the street," Hagen said. "Not every city's like that, you know ... I would think, 'Those people aren't going to do that, what kind of wacko behavior is that?' And you know people in Tucson are just so down with that they're like, 'Yeah, I got me a big ol' head in the garage, I got me some rockets, I'm good to go ... just let me at it!'

"For the All Souls Day parade, we'll have a float using some of the things from the Rialto," said Straw, many of which made their debut this Halloween dangling from the roof of the Hotel Congress. The fire element will be provided by Flam-Chen, arguably Tucson's most unique performing group. While touring with the band Then Tingari, Nadia Hagen had her first encounter with spinning fire. Then, a friend passing through Tucson asked her if she wanted a crash course in the treacherous art, which involves wielding hand-held chains the ends of which are, technically speaking, roaring balls of fire.

"Sure, I want a crash course," she said, "so I stood in this room for countless hours and hit myself in the head." Her hair, it appears, has grown back just fine.

Nadia later met Jeff Thomas, who had been "doing fire" with his own group for some time. Presently, Flam Chen is an ever changing group of fearless fire-bearers, six of whom will showcase their skills the night of the parade. Working in conjunction with McNamara's Spirit Group, Flam Chen members will represent revolving doors between the spiritual world and the non-spiritual world, spinning their fire in the fountains at the Tucson Convention Center.

"As you walk through (the TCC fountains) there's going to be a whole installed performance that will include the Spirit Dancers and Flam Chen and then all of us, and both the orchestras," said Hagen. "I'm just calling them Orchestra One and Orchestra Two.

"We still have to figure out how we're going to haul the cellos around," she mused.

Monday evening, as the Spirit Group wound their way through downtown, rehearsing their dance, and as the puppeteers placed papier-machÚeacute; strips over their works-in-progress, the members of Flam-Chen stood around Luna Loca talking about the different Matts involved in the parade. There's Float Matt (Marcus), and Fire Matt (Patane) and Puppet Matt (Cotton). And eventually, during their rehearsal, numerous people who'd been mentioned as helping with the parade showed up. It was the kind of community interaction that makes this town seem like the only place on earth to be right now - the kind of artistic energy that creates and creates and creates without end or inhibition. "The things that people show up in these processions, and the time that they put into them, and as elaborate as they are, are mind blowing," said Hagen. "It blows my mind every year.

"I still think it takes a special kind of person to put on a large papier-machÚeacute; costume and roam the streets," she continued.

"I like art that you can be a part of," said Marcus, explaining the parade in its simplest form: everyone in the community can take part in the procession this year. Maybe next year, it'll be bigger.

"Next year, I want more bicycles," added Marcus, "and more decorated trailers."