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28x36- #1 - JS4-93 -
: The Joy of Living - 1976 ~
Here we
see Kauyumarie, giving life for the world, so the world could be
full of joy and in the world a lot of good things, so that we are
may live in this world and no one suffers.(One gets the
impression, that JBS made this piece at the point, where there was a
good harvest in that particular year, because he says, now none
suffers. This is the kind of things the Huichol say in a good year).
For this reason, Tatei Yurianaca, our mother fertile earth, ordained
that we celebrate a feast for her and Our Mother, Tateteima.
She is seen as a very well person
in Watetupa (top left). She is not yet fully manifested at all and
is therefore in the world, inside a piak, that represents the
underworld. The peak still has not come through the antlers, that
represent Watecuari, the gates to this world.
But before tatei Yurianaca can
become manifest on this world, Kauyumarie must prepare the world,
all the elements that then will be living fully on earth. He brings
with him the future deer, that will live on the earth in animal
form. There are a male and a female deer (with antlers on her back),
coming to populate the earth with the primary sacrifice, that can be
given to the gods. At the upper right corner we see tatei Haramara,
our mother the ocean, as serpent who was the first to come over the
surface of the earth. She was asked to withdraw from the earth, to
make place for the manifestations of our mother earth, as a dry
fertile ground. Kauyumariethen is speaking the prayers (in form of
birdlike insects), that reach our Great Grandparents in the
underworld, (that's why the insects go down). He is also announcing
from the ground of the earth, that everything is prepared, all the
life brought into earth.
Thus Tatei Yurianaca becomes
completely manifest. She ordains that man celebrate the fertility
of the earth, the fertility of women, the prosperity in life.
This is tatei Neixa, the feast of
the first fruits, in which specially little children called
Tuwainurixi, participate. A child must perform five times at the
ceremony of Tatei Neixa, to become a Wixarica, a Huichol. As long
they haven't done so, they are still called Tuwainu. They are here
represented by their spirit, which is a large moth-like butterfly
called Tuwainu.
The butterfly comes out of the
heavens, where we see manifestations of rain (on the right in white
background) and sunrise on the left.
At the lower left corner we see all
the offerings prepared for the feast or ceremony.
There are burning candles,
tortillas and bowls which would contain Nawa (maize-beer), Hamuitsi
(sweet, white atole) or tsinari (sour atole). There are also two symbols of life
(white), and one of death (black), flowing upwards to heaven.
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| 28x36- #2 -- JS10-93 -- The Path
of Our Older Brother the Lord of Dawn (Tamatsi Pariya)
Here we see how Tatei Yurianaka (that's
Our Mother fertile Earth) was in Watetuapa, in the underworld, before she
was on earth. Paritemai, that is the bearer of light, Young Child Dawn who
did not want to come to be in Wirikuta where everything would appear,
where dawn would appear……Paritemai did not want to go to Wirikuta, did not
want to take the path to Wirikuta, and he is her son. That Maxacuaxi was
calling him. So Maxacuaxi, Deer-Tail, Our Great-grandfather Deer-Tail who
ordained the way of everything in this world, was calling Paritemai and
ordering him to take the path to Wirikuta, but he did not want to heed
those orders. He said that he did not have to go. Tatei Yurianaka said by
force she sent him, by force she ordered him that he had to obey the words
of Kauyumarie, which is identified with Maxacuaxi. Our Mother Yurianaka
had to obligate him, she threatened him as if wanting to hit him, and he
had to go out of the ocean so that he would take the path to Wirikuta.
So this piece is quite well explained in the back in terms of what we see
in front. See, Paritemai, who becomes Tamatsi Pariya, Our Older Brother
the Lord of Dawn, lived in the house, in the ocean of Our Mother Earth,
being her son. That is the house that we see on the bottom left. And he
knew that Great-Grandfather Deer-Tail, also known as Kauyumarie, wanted
him to go to Wirikuta, but he kept refusing to do that. He didn't want to
leave the ocean and take the trail to Wirikuta. He has to take the gourds,
the prayer-bowls, the arrows that are represented, the gourds at bottom
center, the arrows at upper right, along the path which is unfolding at
upper right, and which one of his arms, the upper arm, is reaching
towards, he's going to take that path now that he's been threatened and
his mother has practically beaten him. He didn't want to leave the
under-world and undergo the sacrifice of living in this world, and being
tested in this world until he reached Wirikuta, where he would become Dawn
by the side of Tatei Hautsi Kupuri, Our Mother Dew-soul. At the same
time as-dawn-appears Our Mother Dew-soul also appears, they both become
manifest together. And the calendar that he's going to take, the rope that
he's going to take that is going to be a calendar of his travels, is
represented here next to the path, that is a calendar of knots that are
undone along the pilgrimage or the path that he's going to have to stretch
out into Wirikuta.
About him we have the earth, green and beginning to have life, and beneath
him we have the sacrifice of the founding ancestors, who are even earlier
generically than Dawn for instance, such as Tatutsi Maxacuaxi,
Great-grand-father Deer-Tail, whose very seat has the form of a tail of
the deer, and the feathers you can see within it, you have feathers, you
have antlers, you have all of it, and you have the tail. So he has to take
the sacred bowls and the sacred arrows and carries them into this world,
what corresponds to him, to his part in
organizing life in this world. We have the beginning of his life on
earth.
I think it's interesting to mention that
there is also the sense of being thrown into the world out of the womb,
that is that the ocean is the mother of the earth which has not yet
disassociated herself from the ocean, she's still one being with the
ocean; and his very mother is throwing him out of that womb and into the
world, into the male orders of this path we are to follow; and that the
green, area of this womb is not completely completed as we see with the
five red flowers.
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