Page 57 - Studio International - March 1974

idolater at heart, but it is equally represents truly cold weather. This open just at the moment when the Montezuma himself. The Indians
preposterous to assume that he is not dance commemorates the hunt, and rising sun is exactly centred on the themselves enjoy it but some feel it
a sincere Catholic. Only he assigns celebrates the relation of the tribe to doorway; it comes pouring should be abandoned because it is
to each belief a certain field of action, the buffalo, elk, antelope, deer and in on the dancers, almost blinding us, not really theirs.
and has minutely circumscribed mountain sheep that once sustained and they disappear into its brilliant
each one.' it. The Indian religions maintain no nebula. San Juan Pueblo, December 26,
dichotomy between higher and the Turtle Dance: It begins at sunrise
Taos Pueblo, Christmas Eve: Huge lower life. 'All life forms and natural One sees these dances almost by and proceeds through the day in many
bonfires light the snowy stream-split elements interrelate and interact, accident, no matter how determined appearances, with intervals in which
area between the two ancient many- with no part being more or less one is. The guide books rarely agree as the dancers disappear into one kiva
storied buildings; through them important than another.' Thus any to time and place, sometimes because or another to eat and perform private
winds a procession of masked and animal is man's equal in the over-all these are secretly and suddenly rituals. A long 'chorus' line of some 40
feathered Indians carrying the scheme of life, and the hunting determined through the stars or other male dancers, from children to old
Virgin Mary enthroned on a canopied dances honour the game so it will omens by tribal elders. Nor is there men, dance in step and sing. Their
platform ; when she is taken into the cooperate and allow the people to much in the way of specific bodies are painted grey, and they
church, the dancers disperse. take what they need for food and information in the literature about wear white costumes with bright
Santo Domingo Pueblo, later that clothing. these ceremonials. (An exception to decorations, turtle shell leg rattles, and
night: A simple mass in an Indian- Cochiti Pueblo, 5'oclock Christmas some extent, because of its great elaborate head-dresses of spruce
decorated mission church, the interior morning: The church, humbler than complexity and consistency, is the branches, feathers, and a painted
open, with a continuous stone that of Santo Domingo, is near the Zuni Shalako Festival, which we saw circular plaque, each different, one
bench around the edge. A rather old kiva, heart of the dark village. last year, and could understand even containing a photograph of its
patronizing sermon by a white Gaiety and anticipation, young passably well with the help of the wearer in his youth. Now and then
priest, some wavery carol singing, Indians, friendly and informative old homework we'd done; the Zuni the group at one end of the line turns
psalm reading by an uncomfortably women, and some earnest and religion being one of the best sideways, shaking its hand rattles
dressed-up Indian ; twice during the respectful Anglo tourists. preserved and best documented.) vigorously until the next group turns,
service the thunder of drums, and Suddenly muffled drums are heard Some of the dances we saw this and the next, until the end of the line,
from time to time, piercing birdcalls and the doors fling open tothe dancers, year have been written up and like a gust of wind blowing across a
from small boys in the balcony. who enter in full regalia, full tilt. 'explained' frequently, but each grassy plain, or a mutter running
account differs so from the others, through a crowd. While they dance.
and from our own experience, that two impressive masked turtle figures,
one can only guess at the 'meaning' ; one in white, one in black, circle
provided, that is, that the meaning around them, snapping whips and
can ever be accessible to our feinting at the audience and the
Western culture. This is of course the dancers. Afterwards these two
way the Indians want it and have every participate in a comic interlude
right to maintain it. We felt lucky to be during which Anglo spectators are
there at all. Visitors are tolerated, dragged into the arena and good
usually ignored, sometimes naturedly forced to take part in a
welcomed, sometimes roughly teased narrative which they cannot
and put in their places. understand.
Taos Pueblo, Christmas Day : The The most moving aspect of these
Matachina Dance : Ten lithe young experiences was the wholeness,
males in white slacks, pointed boots, the natural flow of events from
bright silk shawls and kerchiefs over mythology to reality, woven into the
their shoulders, bedecked in people, surroundings, and overtones.
Matachina dance, Taos Pueblo 25 December 1973. Photo : Charles Simonds
multicoloured ribbon streamers. The environment itself is a
Hours after the mass, the church is Another Buffalo Dance, but not the Their curious head-dress, shaped like participant. Vincent Scully has
filled again, this time by a mass of same as last night's. Two Buffaloes; a a bishop's mitre, is velvet, with pointed out that the architecture of
swaying bodies, red-feathered and Buffalo Woman, a Hunter, about a black fringe falling over the face ; the pueblo village is directed outwards
gourd-rattling — men, women, dozen small boy 'deer' in antlers, rhinestone necklaces, brooches, to the natural landmarks around it
children of both sexes—so many spruce and canes, and the older earrings are pinned across it, as though (the contours and directions of the
that some must dance outside the men's chorus. The dance is restrained, on display in a jewellery store, some mountain ranges, mesas, buttes and
doors. A field of waving plumes, very solemn, rising in intensity and in the form of faces ; each dancer rivers) as well as inward to the
drums and singing by a band of old then smouldering down again ; they carries a three-pronged stick with a ceremonial needs of each
men wrapped in blankets as the move back and forth, heads up and cross on it. Other participants are the community, with these ceremonies
crowded bodies dip and straighten, down, in and out around each other, malinche, a little girl in white reaching out again in turn to the
faces solemn, heavy jewellery occasional counterpoint provided by communion dress, the monarca, natural deities whose propitiation
thumping the men's bare and painted the herds of deer skittering across or leader, and a guitarist and a is desired. He attributes the
chests, the women's embroidered the space. Powerful buffaloes — men violinist, who provide a gay 'country' development from the closed hive-
blouses, as their moccasined feet with stocky muscular bodies and big whine. The movements are haughty like network of prehistoric single-
thump the floor. A gentle but solid stomachs, bodies painted, and intricate, resembling a Central building pueblos and cave dwellings
persistent dance, the steps more ankles hung in bells, the rainbow European folk dance, except for the into the increasingly open settings of
complicated than they first seem. serpent painted on their costumes, activities of the three masked clowns, the Chaco Canyon dwellings, with
Another interval, excitement rises ; great hunks of ancient silver, shell, who shamble around the edges isolated ritual grounds and great kivas,
the Buffalo Dance : buffaloes in bone and turquoise around their teasing the audience and are clearly into the present-day pueblo structures,
horned and woolly head-dresses, necks, rattles in their hands. The Indian. At one point the Matachinas to an increasing drought long in the
short buckskin 'kilts' ; several adult woman, in fine white decorated dance around a portable maypole, past, which 'led to a more intensive
deer simulators, with head-dresses buckskins, her hair down, is the moving gracefully with their attempt to draw more of the earth and
of antlers and spruce branches, symbolic mother of all animal life in colourful woven streamers to braid the sky, as well as more of the larger
leaning on short sticks or canes so the region. The hunter is dressed in them up, then reverse and let them human community, into the web of
they hunch over and move like four- skins, an animal head wagging free. ritual.' Thus the sacred Truchas
legged creatures. Outside it is dark rakishly off one hip. Later a similar Peaks determine exactly the
and very cold. The church is a haven dance with different performers, two The Matachina is a fascinating orientation of the long axis of San
of warm light and intense energy, women, and the hunter this time an blend of many cultures, and is not, Juan's major plaza, and 'when the
the rarely experienced energy of older man, truly frightened by his as we suspected while watching it, long files of dancers fill in that space,
deeply-felt religion. participation, whose disorientation genuinely Indian. It originated in the architectural pattern is
gives the whole performance a curious Europe or the Middle East, was complete—the natural and the man-
The buffalo is medicine animal cast. (Everyone in the pueblo brought to Mexico by the Conquerors made together frame the human ritual
for moderate weather and is participates in the dances periodically) or by Philipine missionaries, and to act.'
associated with snow ; the deer It ends with the doors again flung the Pueblos, tradition has it, by Lucy Lippard