Photos: Sergio Betancort
The historical complex of La Villa de Teguise was transformed this Friday for the fourth consecutive year, into a natural setting to accommodate the cultural groups deeply rooted in the "Traditional Carnival". Groups that come from different parts of the peninsula and other islands of the Archipelago that surprised the large audience gathered there with their striking costumes and ancestral dances.
Each year the Department of Culture led by Olivia Duque has the advice of the musician Benito Cabrera in charge of investigating in what places these historical legacies still exist today.
One of the groups present was "Los Guirrios de LLamas de la Ribera de León". These are the most prominent characters of the antruejo, their number is indeterminate and they are in charge of attacking and hitting the public. Their clothing consists of white linen breeches and shirt, a black sash at the waist over which a belt hangs from which the cowbells hang and they wear cowhide albarcas. The most striking thing is its mask, formed by a large cone more than one meter high that is adorned with large colored fans and is finished with fringes and a ponytail. They also wear paper flowers dotting the entire mask, providing other traditional elements such as inflated bladders and large wooden tongs with which they catch the clothes of the spectators.
Another of the groups that participated was "Las Viejas de Caballotas from the island of La Palma", where complicity, fun, ingenuity, mockery and humor were the ingredients used to conquer the public. The spectators were very attentive to discover the mystery that encloses the dance carried out by "Las Viejas de Caballotas". These are double figures, where one of them is false, half old woman and half knight who pretend to be riding on horseback on the old women, dancing to the rhythm of a grotesque polka where the dancers run the carnivals at the expense of their elderly companions.
Humor was also present, easily eliciting laughter from the public with the performance carried out by the "Chirigota sin Clase de Cádiz", where its members, with much irony and class, put on stage the issues of maximum current affairs in all aspects, which today occupy the headlines of the press, radio and television.
The representation of "Los Empolvados de Canarias" was also present at these carnivals. One of the traditions most rooted in the traditional Canarian carnival where its members recalled the custom that men and women had of powdering their faces, either with flour or with talc, and then with family and friends walking the streets. Tradition very rooted in the islands of Gran Canaria, La Palma and Tenerife.
On a night so full of traditions, Lanzarote was represented with the most ancestral of our Carnival festivities, Los Diabletes, Los Buches and Los Toros de Tao y Tiagua filled the streets and Plaza de Los Leones with their color and dances, receiving the warmth of the public present.
Before ending the event, the Councilor for Culture Olivia Duque gave each of the participating groups a replica of the poster announcing the Traditional Carnival. And then, La Parranda El Golpito was in charge of putting the musical notes to end with a lively and participatory masked ball.
