Kayapó-Gorotire / Pará / Brazil
before 2000
Scarlet macaw feathers, midrib of palm leaf, Cotton thread
Among the Kayapó, age group and gender are the main criteria by which people are classified. All men and women pass through a number of social age categories between birth and death. Every age category has a name, is associated with different rituals and rules of conduct and owns a number of optical markers such as feathers, adornments, hairstyles and patterns of body paint that distinguish its members. According to style, design and colour each feather diadem has its own symbolic connotation which either has a cosmological reference or is associated with the everyday world. Red, for example, stands for the female, intimate sphere of the village, blue stands for the male sphere of the public village square, while white symbolises the forest.
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