This year, Zozobra — “Old Man Gloom” — turns 100. Zozobra has grown to be a 50-foot marionette, one of the largest functioning marionettes in the world, according to the Zozobra website. He represents the anxiety, hardships and regrets of the people.
Every year, slips of paper with the “glooms” of attendees are stuffed into the towering effigy, and Zozobra’s arch-enemy, the Fire Spirit, sets it alight. Zozobra’s website refers to the burning as “an annual cleansing ritual for the entire community, offering a fresh start and a renewed hope for the coming year.”
While in line to enter the venue on Friday, Aug. 30 at Fort Marcy Park in Santa Fe, I caught a glimpse of Zozobra from a distance. He had menacing glowing eyes, angular ears and a wide trapezoidal mouth. Clad in a long white gown with a black bow tie, he towered over all of us.
The local legend says that every year, Zozobra would show up and cast a spell over the city, turning children into his loyal ghost minions. However, the townspeople knew that fire had power over him, according to KOAT.
Zozobra was “born” in 1924 — a brainchild of artist William Howard Shuster. Shuster was inspired by the traditions of the Yaqui people, who would burn Judas effigies during Easter Holy Week, according to the Zozobra website. Shuster and E. Dana Johnson, then-editor of a local newspaper, came up with the name “Zozobra,” which is the Spanish word for anxiety.
The modern Zozobra experience features a drone show, fireworks, dances and music. There are combined elements of antiquity and modernity. You can even submit your glooms online if you are unable to be physically present in Santa Fe, and organizers will put them on paper and burn them with the effigy.
The dances tell a story, as dancers dressed in ghost costumes — the “gloomies” — encircle Zozobra before he is vanquished by the townspeople and the Fire Spirit, according to KOAT. Narrative aside, a variety of other performances occur before Zozobra’s burning starts.
Leading up to his burning, Zozobra is an almost-sentient actor. On Aug. 30, when the green lights turned on, he waved his arms in the air, scanning the crowd and taunting it.
Old Man Gloom represents the intersection of performance art, local folklore and ingenuity. I was curious to see what he would look like this year after reading about the Decades Project — a 2014-23 venture to revisit Zozobra’s design through the decades.
He did not have the “fat middle” of the 2013 version, which was modeled after the woes of the 1930s, according to Zozobra’s website. Nor did he have the “Father Knows Worst” cardigan from 2017, modeled after the ‘50s. He instead returned to a more “classic” Zozobra look, sans the black buttons.
When Zozobra burned, flames sprayed down the hinges of his shoulders and crawled up his long white skirt. His moving jaws waggled in the air as flames began to consume his face. A happy face made by drones illuminated the night sky above him.
Get content from The Daily Lobo delivered to your inbox
I do have some words of advice for the event. It could have been made more accessible to people in wheelchairs, the elderly or those that cannot stand up for long periods of time.
The enduring appeal of Zozobra is that it taps into deep human instincts and desires. Manifesting a wish you have, releasing negative emotions and getting closure are all psychological forces that get harnessed by the festival. To animate, and then burn the face of, all your woes is powerful.
“Just as individuals burn paper to release personal burdens, Zozobra offers a collective experience of emotional unburdening,” the Zozobra website reads.
The event is also a celebration of Santa Fe and New Mexico. The drone show on Aug. 30 featured diagrams of a heart denoting Santa Fe’s location in New Mexico. The festival, after all, isn’t just about gloom, but about the regeneration of hope and the strengthening of community.
A collective catharsis felt by young and old emanated from the cheering crowd as the structure was reduced to its skeleton. The New Mexican flag waved over its flaming carcass.
New gloom will set in as humans continue their messy ways, but that’s next year’s problem.
Thank you, Zozobra, for burning alive.
Shin Thant Hlaing is a freelance reporter for the Daily Lobo. She can be reached at culture@dailylobo.com or on X @dailylobo
