Heart of Voodoo II

Journey into the heart and birthplace of voodoo (part II)

Once the offering has been made, the priest will then petition the deity. Sometimes - but not always - the petition comes before the sacrifice, but as this is not a hard and fast rule, I’m presenting it the way I experienced most of the ceremonies. This is not that much different from the purification part we described earlier where either seeds or bones are touched by the supplicant and then thrown on the floor by the priest who then interprets the will of the deity. Among the ceremonies I witnessed, the outcome was positive in all but one.

(v) The DanceNow, this is by far the longest, loudest and more chaotic part of any voodoo ceremony - certainly a photographer’s most infuriating, challenging and potentially fun part of a voodoo ceremony. This is where everyone - and here I do mean everyone - gets involved. There will almost certainly be a “band” - and by band here we mean a group of people playing various percussion and wind instruments…loudly. Very loudly. Continuously - with an energy that really is beyond normal endurance! There will also be singers - sometimes two but most likely 3 or 4, but herein lies the chaos that comes with a voodoo ceremony: everyone is welcome to join - women will jump in and sing at various times, different chants usually “driven” by the spirits. One thing which is worth noting about the singers is they will, almost always, face the crowd and keep their backs to the band - so, for you photographers out there, keep this in mind when choosing your position.

Everyone from 3 villages away will congregate on the ceremony area

And there will be dancers - sometimes they will be wearing complicated outfits, including highly elaborate masks and others it’ll be much simpler, such as grass skirts and palm oil makeup, but in all cases they will be dancing for at least an hour, possibly quite a bit more (I witnessed dances extending to almost 3hrs, with unabated energy!). But, that would be okay if that was the end of it - it is not. 9 times of out 10, the entire village and their neighbours will join. At first they will gather around the area - at every single side and corner (completely destroying any chance of any type of serious photography) and then, as the dance gather pace and intensity, they start crossing the dance area back and forth, crowding the dancers and “getting involved”. And because these are real - not tourist - ceremonies, you cannot ask them to move as they are, strangely and wonderfully enough, part of the ceremony. The more people who show up, the greater the force of the dedication to the deity and therefore the greater the chances of the supplicant getting their wishes fulfilled.

There is a very important piece of information you need to know about the dances. In almost all cases, the dancers (whether they are masked or simply dressed in elaborate costumes - and yes, I am including the infamous zangbetto here) are supposed to be possessed by the spirit of the deity and its assistants or even by the spirit of the animal they just sacrificed. It is the spirit which drives everything and as such the dancers are, for those few hours, holly creatures normal mortals should not touch. This is why they have “minders” who prevent contact and, in a way contain the randomness of the dancers.

Some dances are manifestations of spirit possession of inanimate objects

Dances are an integral part of any voodoo ceremony and sometimes extend well beyond the ceremony itself

Now, normally I’m not a great believer in, well, pretty much anything, so I was extremely sceptical when we witnessed our first possession. And, frankly, our second. However all that changed when we met the Glele. The experience there was completely different and, if I want to be honest, spooky. You see, this was the place where I experienced my first - and only - dog sacrifice but that was not what was spooky. What spooked me a bit was the possession. The moment the dog died, three men from the crowd screamed and jumped up - quite high up - and proceeded to roll around in the soft sand, coating their bodies, hair and clothes.

Possessed dancers will gyrate and roll in the sand

Slashing at their tongue with no blood shows the power of the spirit

Same with slashing at their naked bodies

The crowd instantly parted around them as the started rolling and twisting around, screaming and clutching at their heads. The priests ran to them and guided them into the temple where the priest identified which spirits had possessed them. Then they were disrobed - completely - given a simple grass skirt and a mixture of blood (from the sacrifice), palm oil and yellow powder is poured on them turning them into spectres. Without missing a beat then jumped out of the temple and proceeded, for the next 2hrs, to dance and gyrate around the area, rushing into the rapidly assembling crowd. It was a truly impressive spectacle and one I thoroughly enjoyed being a part of. But this was not over. After about an hour of gyrations and dancing, two of the dancers grabbed knives from the shrine and, after demonstrating how sharp they were, proceeded to slash themselves across the arms, torso and even their tongue, demonstrating the power of the possessing spirit as the knives would not leave a mark on them, regardless how vigorously they slashed. Yeah, science would probably come up with a dozen ways with which to explain how this happens but it really does not matter. All the matters is the passion of the participants and the belief they drove to the people around them - and let me tell you, watching the eyes of some of the viewers, it was incredibly real for them.

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And that’s it. Dances have different “flavours”: they may include groups or individuals, may include pauses or even be split into sections, may involve more extreme elements (I witnessed a dance where the mask went off into the village and visited the home of a local woman whose husband had recently passed away from cancer. In another case the zangbeto mask simply floated out into the lake…something which had not been seen for almost a decade!), so honestly, be prepared for anything and everything. Once the dance part is done well, that’s it… it’s actually a bit surprising how quickly things end. There were times when I would still be packing my cameras and lights and people were already gone!Overall, voodoo is incredibly complex, photographically challenging but very visually rewarding IF you are prepared and ready to put the work into it. Showing up and hoping to get great images…well, that’s simply not going to happen. What I feel is really important here is to acknowledge that this is a living, breathing religion and whenever a ceremony happens - well, a real ceremony, not a tourist performance - it is for the people and it means something to them. So be sensitive and cautious - to do that requires planning and forethought, communication and preparation, so if you do all that, great things will happen.Below is a larger collection of images from the various ceremonies for your reference. However, if you'd like to join us in one of our voodoo photography workshop, with unparalleled access to this mystical religion, we'd love to see you!

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