A primal heart still beats in Europe. Deep beneath the gloss of
cell phone sophistication lie rituals that hark back to harvests and
solstices and fear of the winter dark. Monsters loom in this shadowy
heart, but so does the promise of spring’s rebirth and fertile crops and
women cradling newborn babes. It turns out that Europe—at least pockets
of it—has not lost its connection to nature’s rhythms.
That connection is rekindled during festivals that occur across
the continent from the beginning of December until Easter. The
celebrations correspond to Christian holidays, but the rituals
themselves often predate Christianity. The roots are difficult to trace.
Men—and until recently, it has almost always been men—don costumes that
hide their faces and conceal their true forms. Then they take to the
streets, where their disguises allow them to cross the line between
human and animal, real and spiritual, civilization and wilderness, death
and rebirth. A man “assumes a dual personality,” says António Carneiro,
who dresses as a devilish
careto for Carnival in Podence, Portugal. “He becomes something mysterious.”
Photographer Charles Fréger set out to capture what he calls
“tribal Europe” over two winters of travel through 19 countries. The
forms of the costumes that he chronicled vary between regions and even
between villages. In Corlata, Romania, men dress as stags reenacting a
hunt with dancers. In Sardinia, Italy, goats, deer, boars, or bears may
play the sacrificial role. Throughout Austria, Krampus, the beastly
counterpart to St. Nicholas, frightens naughty children.
But everywhere there is the wild man. In France, he is l’Homme
Sauvage; in Germany, Wilder Mann; in Poland, Macidula is the clownish
version. He dresses in animal skins or lichen or straw or tree branches.
Half man and half beast, the wild man stands in for the complicated
relationship that human communities, especially rural ones, have with
nature.
The bear is the wild man’s close counterpart—in some legends the
bear is his father. A beast that walks upright, the bear also hibernates
in winter. The symbolic death and rebirth of hibernation herald the
arrival of spring with all its plenty. For festival participants, says
Fréger, “becoming a bear is a way to express the beast and a way to
control the beast.”
Traditionally the festivals are also a rite of passage for young
men. Dressing in the garb of a bear or wild man is a way of “showing
your power,” says Fréger. Heavy bells hang from many costumes to signal
virility.
The question is whether Europeans—civilized Europeans—believe that
these rituals must be observed in order for the land, the livestock,
and the people to be fertile. Do they really believe that costumes and
rituals have the power to banish evil and end winter? “They all know
they shouldn’t believe it,” says Gerald Creed, who has studied mask
traditions in Bulgaria. Modern life tells them not to. But they remain
open to the possibility that the old ways run deep.
Charles Fréger is a fine art photographer based in Rouen, France. His latest book, Wilder Mann: The Image of the Savage, was published in 2012.
