Wexner Center's Día de los Muertos is back Friday

The Wexner Center for the Arts has turned Día de los Muertos into a bit of a campus fixture, and its fourth annual celebration lands tomorrow, Friday, October 30, from 4:00 to 7:00 p.m. in the Lower Lobby at 1871 N. High St. It's free for everyone with a ticket, and the whole thing is built for all ages, so it's an easy way to bring the kids into the fold on a holiday that's more about family and memory than anything spooky.

The evening is structured to give you something to do at almost every turn. It opens at 4:00 with ofrendas in the Wexner Library, a comic workshop, and crafts spread across the Lower Lobby and Heirloom Café. A welcome at 4:45 sets the stage in the Performance Space, followed by a poetry reading at 5:00 and dances at 5:15. The reception kicks off at 5:45, and from 6:00 to 7:00 there are free refreshments, which is where the food comes in: tamales, hot chocolate, and traditional pan de muerto, the Mexican bread of the dead. The celebration draws on a Latinx tradition with Mesoamerican Indigenous roots, and it's open to the campus, the Latinx community of central Ohio, and anyone else who wants to drop in.

There's a local creative thread running through it, too. Comic artist and educator Rebecca Richardson is the highlighted local artist for this year's event, and the whole thing is cosponsored by a long list of Ohio State partners: the Department of Spanish and Portuguese, the Latinx Studies Program, the Center for Latin American Studies, the Office of International Affairs, and the Department of Dance, all working with the Wex. If you have questions about tickets, the Visitor Desk is at (614) 292-3535, and for accessibility or accommodations you can email accessibility@wexarts.org or call (614) 688-3890.

If you've got kids who like to draw, there's a side contest worth knowing about. The Center for Latin American Studies is running its fifth annual Día de los Muertos drawing contest, open to both children and adults, with the face of Brutus the Buckeye reimagined as a calavera or sugar skull. Prizes run from sports tickets to Amazon gift cards, and entries need to be in by 7:00 p.m. tomorrow, either in person or by mail to the Leila Vieira Center for Latin American Studies at 140 Enarson Classroom Building, 2009 Millikin Rd., though email submissions at clas@osu.edu are accepted if you can't get there in person.

It's worth noting how the event has grown. Back in 2024, the celebration included a comic-making studio with local illustrator Rafael Rosado, a '¡Presente!' altar activation where people named loved ones and left ofrendas, a 'Living Altars' performance by the Taco Reparations Brigade, and an interactive folklórico piece choreographed by Alfonso Cervera, an assistant professor of dance at Ohio State. The food that year came from Casa Karmelitas and Vainilla y Chocolate, with Mexican Coke and hot chocolate on the side. That same community spirit carries over into 2026, just with a new set of workshops and performances. Whether you're coming for the tamales, the dancing, or just to see the ofrendas, it's a low-key, free way to spend a Friday evening on campus.