The “Mascarones”, a word derived from Mask, is an ancestral ritual linked to the Winter Solstice in which a great part of the town's neighbors, men and women, young, children and elders, participate. It is something deeply rooted in their identity, in the identity of the village itself. It consists of running around the village in groups dressed in costumes made with burlap sacks from the cultivation of tobacco (very common in this region), a mask made with a black or white cloth, a straw hat from working in the fields and cowbells or “campanillos” as they call them there tied to the waist that ring fervently when running and jumping. Formerly they entered the houses to make what was called the “cuestación” which is to ask for some food, such as “chorizo” or other pork sausages, which accompanied with large quantities of wine, they also made practical jokes like throwing salt into the fire of the fireplace to make a flare. According to some testimonies that I received from neighbors, some of them took advantage of the situation to take revenge for some personal matter, since they were masked and could not be recognized. The cowbells were tied behind so that they could not be seen, since in the town they all knew each other so well that they could recognize the person by his cowbells, some could even recognize them by the sound they made.

The neighbors told me that during the fascist dictatorship these celebrations were forbidden but they still continued celebrating. As the village was located on a hill, the children watched the road from the big rocks and warned if the Civil Guard came (police). On one occasion someone was arrested for celebrating the ritual. Formerly they did not carry a torch, they used to do it during the day, but in recent years, after creating a cultural association for the organization of the ritual, they added the torches and to do it at night, to give it a more magical and attractive aspect.

The place where the mural is, in the viewpoint, is where all the “Mascarones” gather in a great circle to sound their cowbells. The mural represents in its left part, “What we see in the Ritual”, a “Mascarón” running, taking inspiration from the scientific illustrations several parts of the body and the costume of this one are indicated, but in the description what we can see are words that make reference to the Ritual itself, more than to the own costume. Since I did not have a real photo of a “Mascarón” running in the posture I was looking for, I asked a neighbor to lend me her son's costume and Sojo, the curator, put it on him to take the photo in the posture I was looking for. On the upper part of the mural is painted a photograph of all the “Mascarones” in a circle with the torches, taken in the same location where the mural is located years before. On the right side we see “What really happens”, a large surface with a drawn pattern, which alludes to the movement of energy, of the invisible fabric that connects all living things, that fabric that is modified and interacts when the entire village enters into communion to perform the ritual and invoke the forces of life.