This Maskmaker Is Blending Realities for Dia de Los Muertos

Thrillist Video

Rachel Pozivenec wants you to step outside of your skin.

When the maskmaker crafts one of her clay visages, usually of a local animal (or its skull), she hopes you’ll “open yourself to what this mask can offer.”

Walking down the street in your new, primal persona, you not only challenge everyone to look at you differently -- you’re forcing yourself to see the city around you differently. Through the interruption, she actually hopes to bring people together. For that same reason she joins other artists for El Dia de Los Muertos -- the Day of the Dead -- in a toast to all that we are together, and all that has gone before.

“The fact that Day of the Dead is of such prominence to Latin American culture,” Pozivenec says, “I think it’s something that we can all learn from. It’s a respect and an appreciation of that cycle, and that next stage, and how these different realities do blend together and merge in more ways than we realize.”