Folklife Altar Project

Hindu Altar  

The Shrine for Sri Ganesha was created by participants from the Hindu Temple of Greater Chicago and the daily rituals were led by priests Yagneswaran Ganapathyraman and Vanamoorthy Achari. The shrine is a site for puja, the ritual of worship and welcome, in honoring a deity. Flowers, consecrated food, and incense are key items in the shrine. In Hinduism, the deities each have favorite items that are crucial to including on altars. Festival visitors gave offerings to Sri Ganesha, the elephant-headed Hindu god of learning, and learned about Hindu devotional practices. 

Photo by Sonya Pencheva, Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives

Natalie Solis

This portable altar was created at La Casa Azul, Frida Kahlo’s home in Coyoacán, Mexico City on Day of the Dead. Celebrating in Mexico with my two best friends from Divinity School, we made altars, painted our faces, dressed up as Catrinas, and spent the day connecting with our ancestors. This altar honors my two abuelos, Jose Dolores Amador and Javier Solis, in addition to my favorite artists and authors, Selena Quintanilla, Gloria Anzaldúa, Bell Hooks, and Michel Foucault.

Bonnie Ilza Cisneros

I worked with my mother to build an altar for Rosie Jimenez, a Tejana mother and student whose tragic death in 1977 was a direct result of men’s laws on women’s bodies. She was working to become a teacher while raising a little girl on her own. The altar aesthetics, I hope, convey her style and times in the Río Grande Valley, and it is all crowned with forty-two crocheted roses my mom made with so much love and intention representing the number of years Rosie and her daughter have spent apart. The altar was commissioned by Planned Parenthood South Texas and displayed at the Esperanza Peace & Justice Center during Muertos season 2022.  

Afro-Brazilian Candomblé de Ketu Altar  

With this Afro-Brazilian Candomblé de Ketu altar, the Oakland-based community Egbe Omo Alairá invited Festival visitors to engage with the constellation of Orixá (divine entities) devotion stretching from West Africa to Brazil, the Caribbean, the United States, and beyond. In this African-descended tradition from northeastern Brazil, initiates embark on lifelong journeys to serve the Orixás who are invoked through the regalia, food, and offerings included in the altar.  

Photo by Craig Fergus, Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives

Jo Virgil

I love to travel to nature places, where I feel connected in spirit to all things. And each place I go, I look for a small Buddha statue as a reminder of my journey, both literal and spiritual. I consider myself a True Buddhist, because I love that the Buddha taught us to listen to as many perspectives from people as we can, but we each need to find our own path. My altar with Buddha statues always opens my heart!

Alfombra de aserrín

The alfombra de aserrín (sawdust carpet) created by Ubaldo Sánchez and the local Guatemala Maya Mam group Guate-Maya DC is an ephemeral spiritual arts practice. Rooted in Maya and Spanish culture, the two alfombras created for the Festival celebrate the contributions of women in preserving culture. Bringing together Catholic and Maya symbolism, through Our Lady of Guadalupe and the goddess Ixchel, deity of the moon and weaving, the alfombra celebrates the syncretism and hybridity of the changing religious and spiritual landscape in Guatemala and in the Guatemalan diaspora. 

Photo by Stanley Turk, Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives

Jeffrey Zwartjes

I am originally from San Antonio, Texas, and I was blessed to be raised there with all four of my grandparents present, and to even have all of them in my life until well into my adult years. Now the culture of my hometown and the love of my family stays with me wherever I go. I am also an avid toy collector and feel that toys and small objects, many handed down to me from family members, help me stay tied to the people and places that shaped my heart and core beliefs. I am very drawn to Mexican alebrijes and collect the colorful figurines, often of animals that had special meaning to me and my loved ones: frogs, rabbits, pigs, squirrels. Shaping my collections into a permanent ofrenda in my home has kept the memory of those I’ve lost in life vividly alive and given me a direct line to the love I’ve received from my family throughout my life.

Mandala

Created by Venerable Lama Losang Samten and apprentice Soo Kyong Kim over the first nine days of the 2023 Folklife Festival, the Tibetan Buddhist sand mandala is a symbolic image of the universe. The mandala is made from colored sand, and its ephemeral nature is a reminder of life’s impermanence. On the last day of the Festival, the artists and fellow Creative Encounters participants ceremonially dispersed the mandala as an act of extending its healing and enlightening powers the world.  

Photo by Julie Byrne, Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives

Flora Lazo-Ricaurte

This is dedicated to parents who we have lost. Both my husband and I lost our parents in the span of five years. COVID definitely impacted us, and we remember their spirits and energy to keep us hoping and embracing our love from within.  

Rebecca Missel

This is the home altar I created for Rosh Hashanah 2020. It has photos of loved ones—living and dead—who at that time I hadn’t been able to see in some time because of the pandemic. And then, because Ruth Bader Ginsburg died on Erev Rosh Hashanah, I added my copy of the Notorious RBG book in her memory. There’s also cherished objects, like the Kiddush cup I’ve had since childhood, an apple filled with honey, a jar full of spices to represent blessings for the New Year that my sister created, Hungarian china from my beloved grandmother, a growing plant, etc. Many hopes and dreams and wishes represented here for a future where we can connect with each other and be in community together.

Sitalin Sanchez 

I was born in an Aztec community in Mexico. During the year, our altars are elaborated with paper tissue, and only during Day of the Death we use marigold flowers. This is my first year living in the United States. Since marigold flowers are rare and expensive here, I decided to do my altar following the artwork we use on a daily basis. 

Mariana Reyes

Tito Matos forever and ever. This is the altar me and my son prepared for his father in our home. It includes part of his ashes in a pandereta urn, a microphone for him to sing plena, and a caneca with rum and a glass of water. We put candles and plants in it. A picture of him, moving, playing basketball and being alive and happy, is the center of our home. 

Jane Dulay

Retablos were my way of memorializing my siblings who passed away between 2010 and 2021. They tell the story of their passions and failings of their physical bodies that led to their early demise, leaving me alone in telling the history of my nuclear family. As Filipino Americans, colonized by the Spaniards and the U.S., the Catholic Church was and continues to be a major magical thinking in the salvation and redemption of the soul.

Alec Esparza

This “Blue Heaven” altar by Alec Esparza pays tribute to his favorite L.A. Dodgers players who have passed on, as well as family members who were longtime fans.

Esparza Family Altar  

The Folklife Festival ofrenda (offering) created by the Esparza family from East Los Angeles is a bridge to connect with ancestors and departed loved ones. For the Esparza family, the craft of making ofrendas is an intergenerational practice. A significant component of the ofrenda is the arch, which bridges the two worlds of the living and the dead. Festival volunteers and visitors assisted in creating hundreds of handmade, cempasúchil (marigold) paper flowers that adorned the arch and ofrenda. The Esparzas honor handmade objects, from the paper flowers to the hanging recuerdos with the names of ancestors, as sacred.  

Photo by Grace Bowie, Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives

Martha C. Galvan Mandujano

This altar is very important because I can give honor to all my family and friends who have passed. I keep their memories alive. All the objects represent things they loved. My mom loved bikes and was very faithful to the Virgen de Guadalupe. 

Denise Esparza

Growing up in an altar-making family, Denise Esparza is an altarista and participant in the Creative Encounters: Living Religions in the U.S. Festival program. Denise’s altar highlights the practice of comadrazgo (co-mothering), the ritual kinship relationship between a mother, child, and comadre (godmother). Being a comadre takes on a spiritual dimension as this lifetime bond develops into a caretaking role strengthened over a lifetime. This altar honors comadres, including the favorite objects of Denise’s comadre.

Aníbal Mejia

Aníbal Mejia, an olorixá adoxu (priest) in Candomblé de Ketu, an African-descended tradition from Brazil, is a participant in the Creative Encounters: Living Religions in the U.S. Festival program. Based in Oakland, Aníbal’s home altar centers his Candomblé de Ketu practice.

Puerto Rico Altar 

In Loíza, Puerto Rico, traditions rooted in African ritual and spiritual beliefs are celebrated through the festival of Santiago Apóstol (Apostle James the Great). This altar created by the Boricua participants, mask-maker Verónica Osorio and group Bomba Yemayá, honors Santiago Apóstol, the patron saint of Loíza, whose feast day in July is the central point of the festival celebrations. Accompanying Santiago Apóstol are the flag and colors, red, yellow, and green, of Loíza. The vejigantes mask created by loiceña (native of Loíza) Verónica Osorio is central to the dance and masquerade celebrations, representing the Spanish Moor, African, and native Caribbean influence that is part of daily life in Loíza. 

Photo by Sonya Pencheva, Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives

Rachel Crump Matheus

My husband is from Peru and I am from the United States. When the Pixar movie Coco came out, my then-ten-year-old daughter begged me to take her to see it. As a person who loves family history, I have seen the healing power of discovering the stories of our families and the sense of connection that comes from knowing that parts of me came from them. Coco illustrates that beautifully.

A few days later, my daughter asked me who would be on the ofrenda—the wall of family pictures and memories—for our family. This gave me the chance to tell her about a few family members she did not know. Thanks to FamilySearch and the Family Tree app, and the memories that can be saved and shared there, I could even show her some of their faces.

By the end of the conversation, my daughter felt a deeper connection to her ancestors, and I felt a deeper connection to her. I realized that I needed to save my memories of these people for my future grandchildren so that they can also know those on our ofrenda.

Rachel is part of the team that produces the RootsTech Family History Conference at FamilySearch.

As a participant in the Folklife Festival, Rachel is part of the team sharing genealogy resources and family history activities at the Family History tent.

Vodun Altar  

Visiting from Ouidah, Benin, Vodun priestesses and community historians Martine de Souza and Jeanne Paul de Souza created this altar for the West African deity Mamy Wata. Vodun is a living body of beliefs and practices involving healing, the remembrance of ancestors, and worship of divine beings originating from coastal West Africa. Vodun deities have diverse origins and are often connected with aspects of the natural world, made visible by the materials used in the altar. Through the altar, Martine and Jeanne Paul demonstrated Vodun divination and ceremony with Festival visitors. 

Photo by Sonya Pencheva, Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives