YOEME SYMBOLISM
The Yoeme mask maker's art explained:
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Black — The death that everyone goes through.
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Red — The blood of Christ.
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White — Candlelight; every human life. It also represents Christ's robes and the fact that He died to bring us life.
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Cross on the forehead — For the Father and Son; and the four directions. It also is a blessing for the dancers and their families and everyone at the fiesta.
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Triangles (around the mask's outer edge) — Again, the Father and Son and the beam of life that gives life to all around us — trees and animals, too.
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Lizards or butterflies — Nature.
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Dots — Our relatives who have passed to the "Flower World."
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Triangles (under the eyes) — Teardrops. The sadness that comes from (when the Yoeme were killed and uprooted during) the Mexican Revolution.
The last things to be added to the mask are the eyebrows and beards "for the old man" — made of tufts of horsehair inserted through little holes and secured on the inside.
- Louis David Valenzuela, Arizona Daily Star, Oct. 4, 2009
