Since pre-Columbian times, the Otomí people of the Sierra Norte de Puebla have made amate bark paper, which represents the basis of their economy and traditions. In their rituals, they represent their deities as cutout bark-paper figures that symbolize certain spirits and elements of nature.

I have visited the town of San Pablito Pahuatlán several times over the years and I’ve observed the processes involved in the making of amate paper and some rituals of the Otomí—or Ñañu, as they call themselves in their own language.

For this piece I collaborated with a shaman and an artisan from the town. I sensitized two large pieces of amate paper with cyanotype emulsion, and on these a kind of “cleansing ritual” was carried out in order to bless the project and to ensure that the desired results were achieved. The ceremony was divided into two parts, which determined how long the cyanotypes were exposed to the sun. In the first part, two ceremonial musicians dedicated their songs to mother earth: candles were lit and cigarettes and cane liquor were presented as offerings to the bark-paper deities placed on a “death table.” In the second part of the ceremony, while the musicians kept playing, a black hen was sacrificed and its blood was poured on the table while a red rooster was given sugarcane liquor to drink. At the end of the ceremony, everything that had been used and had “absorbed evil” was disposed of: the musicians played one last song in the cemetery while the ceremonial elements were thrown into the adjacent ravine.