Tens of thousands of Mexicans and tourists witnessed this Sunday the “Mega Procession of the Catrinas”, a parade of skeletons in Mexico City (CDMX) that serves as a prelude to the Day of the Dead, a very special day for the Latin country.
The participants put on makeup and dressed as catrinas, characters that simulate being skulls created by the illustrator José Guadalupe Posada, famous for his drawings of typical local scenes, folklore, sociopolitical criticism and for his illustrations of “skeletons” or skulls; and named after the muralist Diego Rivera.
They marched from the Angel of Independence to the Zócalo through Paseo de la Reforma, the main avenue of the country’s capital.
This time the parade will celebrate 10 years after starting in 2014 with a group of just 25 makeup artists and less than 2,000 participants. Since then, the event has become one of the most significant traditions of the Day of the Dead in Mexico City, which expects to receive 225,680 tourists in hotels for the final festivities on November 1 and 2, 15% more than in the 2022.
In addition to this event and the relevant celebrations of the two days indicated above, CDMX will hold a Night Walk of the Dead on October 28, the Day of the Dead parade on Saturday, November 4, and will install a mega ofrenda in the Zócalo.
The city’s Citizen Security Secretariat (SSC) has assigned 1,371 Proximity, Metropolitan and Traffic Control Undersecretariat police officers for the festivities’ security operation.
This 2023 marks 20 years since Mexico’s Day of the Dead was declared Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity by UNESCO, and since then the figure of the Catrina has been an emblematic element of the holiday.
La catrina is a character created by the Mexican painter, illustrator and caricaturist from Aguascalientes, José Guadalupe Posada and is the figure most associated with the Day of the Dead.
At first the skull was not dressed and only wore a hat, in reference to the poverty of Mexicans in the first half of the 20th century, but in 1947 the muralist Diego Rivera used this character, put an elegant outfit on it and baptized it as “La Catrina” in her mural “Dream of a Sunday afternoon in Alameda Central”.
