“¡Que Viva!”
That’s what 20,000 people will chant tonight in Santa Fe as Old Man Gloom, aka Zozobra, burns to the ground.
The Kiwanis Club has constructed the 50-foot effigy for the past 85 years on Fort Marcy and Magers Field.
Ray A. Valdez has produced the event for 16 years and said it gets bigger and better as time goes on.
“We do have a bigger firework show this year. We’ve got a great Zozobra with new special effects, and we changed up our ticketing system to make it easier for people,” Valdez said.
You can purchase tickets at the Lensic Box Office or at TicketSantaFe.com, Valdez said. Tickets are $5 in advance or $10 at the ticket booth on the south side of the field.
Raymond Sandoval is the face artist and head pyrotechnician for Zozobra. He said people may not understand the meaning of Zozobra, but once they experience the fireworks, the music and the flaming 50-foot effigy, they’ll be hooked.
Zozobra consists of about 20,000 people gathering in a park for live music, poetry and fireworks, which culminates in the burning of Old Man Gloom. He symbolizes all the bad things that have happened in the past year, and once he burns to the ground, so does all the gloom.
Zozobra is stuffed with people’s contributions: letters, blog entries, marriage and divorce licenses and anything else you want burned with him.
“It’s something very cathartic,” Sandoval said. “In our day-to-day technological world, there’s something very primal about fire, and there’s something very primal about chanting and being in a big crowd. I think it’s a really amazing thing for people to be able to take what’s bothering them and put it on something else, metaphorically, and then light it on fire.”
The creator of Zozobra, Will Schuster, came to Santa Fe with a group of artists in the 1920s.
“We often refer to the artists as the bohemians of the era. They had better ideas of how to burn things and they had better fireworks,” Valdez said. “So they decided that you could burn your gloom away.”
Zozobra is now on Thursday nights, but that wasn’t always the case. It used to be held on Friday nights, but the celebration became rowdy and there were several violent incidents. Valdez said security is a priority, and paramedics are on hand.
“We’ve always had excellent security,” he said. “We hire a security force of over 100 people. The Police Department have over 100 people, and the state police come and join them.”
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Miquela Gonzales, Santa Fe Police Department crime analyst, said she has gone to Zozobra for a long time and has never seen any problems with crowd control or violence.
“Personally, when I attend the event, I take my daughter and her friends,” Gonzales said. “Every time I’ve gone, I’ve never witnessed or seen any incidents that would keep me from attending. Professionally (since Zozobra moved to Thursday), I can’t recall a time where we’ve had anybody who actually died at Zozobra.”
The Rail Runner Express will extend its service so that the last train leaves Santa Fe at 11 p.m.
Before Zozobra burns, there will be live music, fire dancers and poetry performances to keep audiences entertained, Valdez said.
“Our headlining band is Soul Fire. We love having them back every year,” Valdez said. ”They will be the last band that goes on before Zozobra burns. We have special poets from Warehouse 21. They are going to be our in-betweeners, so in between the acts we’re going to have poets. And we have a special musical interlude before the lights go out this year.”
All the profits from Zozobra go to educational scholarships in the Santa Fe community, Sandoval said.
“It’s both past-and future-oriented,” Sandoval said. “It ties Santa Fe to it’s past, but all the proceeds that we raise go back to scholarships for kids. It’s about holding on to your traditions, but its goal is to fund education for kids in the future.”
‘Will Schuster’s Zozobra’
Fort Marcy and Magers Field Park
Intersection of Bishops Lodge Road and Artist Road
Today
Gates open at 3 p.m. Burning begins around 9 p.m.
For tickets, call the Lensic box office at 505-988-1234 or go to TicketSantaFe.com
