Mingei International Museum Presents ~ Carnival ~

Monday, 07 August 2006 10:19

San Diego, CA - A major exhibition exploring carnival celebrations in Europe and the Americas is at Mingei International Museum in Balboa Park.  Organized by the Museum of International Folk Art, Santa Fe, New Mexico and UCLA's Fowler Museum, the exhibition includes colorful, exuberant celebrations from Laza, Spain, Venice, Italy, Basel, Switzerland, Tlaxcala, Mexico, Oruro, Bolivia, Recife and Olinda, Brazil, Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobango and New Orleans, Louisiana.  Each location is represented by mannequins dressed in its carnival costumes presented against a photographic backdrop showing its celebration. Videos of each celebration accompany the exhibition, which continues through September 3.

Originally a Roman festival, the word, carnival or carnaval in Spanish, comes from Latin roots meaning flesh, farewell.  By the 14^th century carnival had become a prelude to Lent — a period of rowdy, boisterous games and self-indulgence that began in January. For the aristocracy, there were masked balls and comical theatrical performances.  The rest of the population celebrated with charivaris — groups performing rude songs, accompanied by banging pots and pans and occasionally dousing revelers with buckets of ashes or water or mumming — begging for food from house to house that was then cooked as a communal evening meal.  Revelers often dressed in animal skins and wore bells, calling attention to the rebirth of life in spring and winter's end.  Processions, floats and satirical performances were common in the towns, and these celebrations continued through the 18^th century in Europe and the French, Spanish and Portuguese speaking parts of the New World.

The Industrial Revolution in the 19^th century and the rise of the bourgeoisie turned carnival into a civic event.  The middle class began to attend the balls and parties hitherto reserved for the aristocracy.  The independence of New World colonies during the 19^th century brought a new dimension to carnival with former slaves and Indians, who had previously been excluded, participating both in neighborhood festivities and the general celebration.  Parades and balls predominate in 20^th and 21^st century carnival, but costumes and boisterous behavior continue.

In Laza, Spain, carnival is Entroido.  Medieval customs survive with the plays performed with music and dance and revelers' throwing buckets of ashes, flour and water at one another.  Carnival returned to Venice in the 1980s.  Costumes and gondola parades are its hallmarks.

Fasnacht is observed the week after the beginning of Lent in Protestant Basel, Switzerland with fife and drum troupes and costumes designed around themes of social criticism.  Revelers in Tlaxcala, Mexico's Carnaval go from house to house performing quadrilles and poking fun at the country's European colonizers.  Offerings are offered to the Andean gods and devotions are made to the Virgin Mary in Oruro, Bolivia.

Recife and Olinda, Brazil continue to celebrate carnival in the European manner.  Costumes and choreography can also be inspired by African, Brazilian, and Indian myth. Mas in Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago is a chance for everyone to dance through the town.

Mardi Gras in New Orleans is a series of public parades and private balls put on by groups called krewes.  New Orleans' minority community's Indians present an alternative celebration wearing elaborate costumes.

ìCARNAVAL! Is accompanied by a book of the same name. The exhibition Curator is Barbara Mauldin, Project Director - ìCARNAVAL! - Curator of Latin American Art, Museum of International Folk Art, Santa Fe, New Mexico.  David Mayo - Director of Exhibitions - UCLA Fowler Museum of Cultural History, Los Angeles California, designed the exhibition.

Visit the Mingei International Museum at : http://www.mingei.org/