THE STORY OF OLD MAN GLOOM

Zozobra was the creation of Santa Fe artist William Howard Shuster Jr., who was himself a spirited rebel. The inaugural construction of his giant burning puppet in 1924 was part of a larger rebellion. It all began when Fiestas de Santa Fe organizers announced they would charge fiestagoers a fee to attend the event.

Shuster, fondly known to his friends as Shus, and other local artists scoffed at the idea, saying the requirement would prevent the city’s poorest residents from participating in the revelry. They decided to create a free parallel event in protest and called it El Pasatiempo. Their fiesta included a pet parade and the hysterical pageant.

And of course, the burning of Zozobra — a large marionette made of cotton cloth and wood stuffed full of glooms.

Shuster burned the first Zozobra that year in his backyard during a private party for his friends. Zozobra would make his first public appearance in 1926 when the two fiestas combined.

The artist was known as much for his eccentricity as for his professional accomplishments. When he first went to Santa Fe, Shuster met famed Ashcan School artist John Sloan, who served as his artistic mentor. Shuster, Willard Nash, W.E. Mruk, Josef Bakos and Fremont Ellis formed the original Santa Fe Art Colony, Los Cinco Pintores, in deference to the city’s Spanish heritage. The five artists showed their work throughout the U.S. Shuster’s work hangs in the permanent collection of the New Mexico Museum of Art.

Shuster got the idea for Zozobra when he traveled to Mexico and witnessed Yaqui Indians carrying a cartonería (papier-mâché sculpture) of Judas around the Stations of the Cross during Easter Holy Week. The villagers stuffed the Judas effigy with firecrackers and set him ablaze when they completed the ceremony. It was Shuster’s friend E. Dana Johnson, editor of the Santa Fe New Mexican, who chose the fearsome name.

“Zozobra” is Spanish for “the gloomy one.” It also translates to “anxiety.”