ERENDIRA IKIKUNARI’S COSTUME DESIGN

ERENDIRA IKIKUNARI’S costume design was developed from the illustrations of the XVI century codex RELACION DE MICHOACAN, were all the social strata of the pre-Columbian Purehpecha Indians appear depicted. Considering that all of these illustrations of wardrobe are stylizations, their translation into three-dimensional concrete costumes was a challenge of interpretation. Instead of using the original materials and textiles, such as tiger or deer leather, tropical bird feathers, raw cotton or jute fabrics, we employed materials used by contemporary ethnic groups, like straw mats, which served to create armor, or hand woven fabrics. Instead of embroidering them, we used textile paint, imitating the codex’s drawings. The end result was very interesting, because when we combined the actors thus dressed with enlargements of characters in the codex’s drawings, on the set or in digital compositing, all the elements blended seamlessly. And the proposed look of the film, a cinematic pre-Columbian codex, was attained.

Another challenge was to present the European XVI century soldiers as supernatural beings, because they have turned into conventional images. We tried to see them as the Indians did, as “Ironclad warriors that had descended from heaven”; we found the answer in the folk dance of the “Curpitis”, created by the Purehpecha Indians. In that dance we see the Europeans through Indian’s eyes, with their faces covered by wooden masks that depict the white man. The Europeans’ costumes were a combination of renaissance armor with the wardrobe of the “Curpitis” Dance, including, of course, the white man’s masks. We also used masks to depict divinities. Purehpecha’s devils masks were used to represent pre-Columbian gods and even the horse used a metallic mask, acquiring by association a divine quality. This of course, until the Indians unmask the invaders, realizing that they are only human.

The only one that never looses his mask is the horse.