SAVE THE DATE!
2023 TANA Dia de Muertos Celebration
Saturday, October 28, 2023
4PM - 7PM (Program Starts at 5PM)
TANA / 1224 Lemen Ave. Woodland, CA 95776
Join us Saturday, October 28, 4pm- 7:00pm as we gather in community to honor ancestros and to reconnect with our spirit and one another! You’re invited to celebrate in community with ofrendas, food vendors & comida, live performances, Día de Muertos–themed crafts for all ages, and more. TANA’s annual commemorative event will feature a live DJ, local Aztec danza Kalpulli Tlayolotl, a featured guest artist ofrenda, and multiple community member-led altars that honor friends, family, and loved ones. Day of the Dead themed activities will include ink block printing, calaca mask decoration, and face painting. Enjoy live printing, and silkscreen prints made by TANA participants, interns, and area artists, and a special Woodland High School student Dia de Muertos themed artwork exhibit.
This year’s celebration marks a joint collaborative effort between sister organizations in the region titled “City of Altars”. Together, 4 leading arts organizations including TANA, Latino Center of Art and Culture, Sol Collective, Washington Neighborhood Center, and Sojourner Truth Museum African Heritage Museum will activate each cultural space to honor respective customs and ancestral traditions, while collectively shining a light on issues that most impact our communities through the sacred practice of altar making.
At TANA we will highlight this sacred traditional practice through community member made altars and a unique ofrenda led by artist Elyse Doyle-Martinez, in collaboration with youth from the Brown Issues Yolo County chapter, a statewide youth leadership organization dedicated to cultivating the next generation of Brown leaders through civic-engagement, healing, and narrative change.
Throughout the month of October, TANA will also offer free workshops facilitated by artists Elyse Doyle-Martinez, Ro Mottsmith and others that will include Dia De Muertos poetry, altar building, sugar skull making, and printing on fabric.
Join us as we gather and celebrate in community!
DIA DE MUERTOS
WORKSHOPS / FREE AT TANA!
Dia De Muertos Poetry Workshop
Tuesday, October 10, 2023
4:30PM
Location: TANA / 1224 Lemen Ave.
Poetry and spoken word have been used to heal, build community, and allow individuals to be the orators of their own reality. When a young person loses their life, the immediate response is to ask why, place blame, and look for answers - but the very real experiences of a community before and after a loss, are often overshadowed in an attempt to find those answers. There are few spaces for young people, especially young Brown people to feel safe and heard after the loss of a loved one. This can lead to anxiety, depression, and potentially further loss of life. Our first Dia De Muertos workshop will be a reflective poetry workshop where we will hold space with community members and help guide them through their own creative process of expressing themselves through poetry.
Building an Altar, Sugar Skulls, Printmaking
Tuesday, October 17, 2023
4:30PM
Location: TANA / 1224 Lemen Ave.
Local Mexican/American, non-binary artist, Ro Mottsmith, will be leading a workshop on the meaning of Dia De Muertos, building an altar, and the making of sugar skulls. Participants will be able to design and create their own sugar skull to take home, or to leave on the community altar through the Dia De Muertos event. Elyse Doyle-Martinez will be doing a demonstration of printing on fabric. The pieces of fabric being printed on will have a design for the Long Live our Jóvenes altar and participants will be able to take home one of the pieces to add to their own home altar.
About TANA's
City of Altars Altarista:
Lead Altarista, Elyse Doyle-Martinez, is an artist, educator, and advisor with the organization Brown Issues. Brown Issues is a statewide youth leadership organization dedicated to cultivating the next generation of Brown leaders through civic-engagement, healing, and narrative change. Since 2020, Youth from the Brown Issues Yolo County chapter have worked together to build an altar to honor the young lives that have been lost to community violence. In less than a year, five young men who lived in Woodland lost their lives to senseless gun violence. More recently, it has been fentanyl overdoses, suicides, and reckless decisions that have taken the lives of even more young people in Woodland. No matter the case, the words Long Live adorn social media profiles, t-shirts, and photos of family and friends who have lost their loved ones. Long Live Our Jóvenes will continue to be the theme for the altar we create for the young people we’ve lost, and for the young people we continue to serve. This altar will include elements of traditional altar making, with a 4-panel mural backdrop that will be designed and executed by Elyse, her students, former students, and community members. Death is a part of life, but all of the young people who will be honored on this altar were taken far too soon from this world. To honor their memories, we will celebrate them during Dia De Muertos, and continue to advocate for greater access to resources, mentors, and community spaces that are for our young people.