[ocan]

Actually, I was quite surprised to see this fashion trend in the U.S. because in Mexico it has been made fashionable for a long time. The skull and skeleton is a part of the Mexican culture specifically because of the day of the dead, a day were people gather to celebrate their deceased loved ones not as a sorrowful event but as a happy and joyous one to remember them.

For example "La Catrina" is a "1913 zinc etching by Mexican printmaker José Guadalupe Posada. The image has since become a staple of Mexican imagery, and often is incorporated into artistic manifestations of the Day of the Dead in November, such as altars and calavera costumes. The etching was part of his series of calaveras, which were humorous images of contemporary figures depicted as skeletons, which often were accompanied by a poem." [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catrina] Things like this have become an icon of the Mexican culture.

Many artists use this icon in their art, for example, [http://www.mexconnect.com/mex_/trave...145mjdod1.html], [http://disintergrate.deviantart.com/...zucar-75015891], [http://www.fabricattic.com/Calaveras%20skulls%20red.jpg] and [http://i32.photobucket.com/albums/d4...kles/skull.jpg] . Another traditional use of the skeleton is in figures called calacas. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calaca] [http://www.mexconnect.com/mex_/trave...asmuertos.html]