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I stumbled across this dance--called The Huehue (or so a bemused resident explained)--on a recent trip to Puebla, Mexico . It said that one of the main characters of this dance is always the devil, as seen here. It is also said that the tradition has its roots in Day of The Dead, and depicts the wise old men--or huehues--who would help the newly widowed women find shelter.

This wonderful figurine, from Mexico City and sourced by our friend Daisy Tainton, depicts the miraculous Niño del Consuelo, or The Holy Child of Consolation. It is a copy of a miraculous 18th century statue in Chalma, Mexico. This figure is best known as an advocate for children; when he grants a miracle on behalf of the child, offerings of toys or baby clothes are left in thanks. [Source]

My new book Death: A Graveside Companion will be published by Thames and Hudson this October. A large scale picture book of nearly 400 pages, it contains over 1,000 images--many never before published, and largely drawn from the Richard Harris Art Collection --tracing humankind's attempts to imagine and that great, inevitable unknown mystery of human life: namely, death. The book features 19 essays by a broad variety of thinkers that will be familar to readers of this blog, including Mel Gordon (author of Voluptuous Panic and Grand Guiginol ), Michael Sappol (formerly of the National Library of Medicine), Mark Pilkington of Strange Attractor, cultural critic Mark Dery , and John Troyer of the Centre for Death and Society. Essays cover topics ranging from paintings created via channeling the spirits of the dead to eros and thanatos (sex and death) to 19th century horror theater to anatomized figures of Jesus Christ crafted for unknown purposes in 17th century Europe; See belo...