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- Admired, bullied, surrounded by mystery and stereotypes, redheads have glowed through history, religion, art and mythology - generally associated with extremes.
- Spread over three days, the Redhead Days Festival “welcomes redheaded guests and their family and friends from around the globe," the organizers explain on their site. "No entrance required.”
Every year on the first weekend of September, an extraordinary gathering of thousands of unusual people occurs in the picturesque, southern Dutch town of Breda. They get together for Redhead Days, a festival that unites natural redheads from around the world, without distinctions of shades or styles.
“Neither blonde nor brown, the redheaded are a people apart," author Xavier Fauche claims in his book Roux et Rousses: Un Eclat Très Particulier,” published in France. "They are a minority who define themselves from the gaze that others bear on them because they do not constitute an ethnic group and have neither a community of language nor a common cultural heritage.”
Admired, bullied, surrounded by mystery and stereotypes, redheads have glowed through history, religion, art and mythology - generally associated with extremes. Mars, the god of war, and Biblical figures like King David, Judith, Cain, Judas and even the Virgin Mary have been represented as redheads.
The iconography of gingers’ stereotypes in art is immense. Painters and writers have glorified them. Botticelli’s Venus, works by Amedeo Modigliani, Edvard Munch and Vincent Van Gogh’s self portraits, to mention a few.
“Come and enjoy yourselves at our Friday evening kick-off party and we will keep you entertained the whole weekend with a variety of events and activities including photo shoots, fashion shows, workshops, readings, exhibitions, kids’ activities, music and dance.”
The festival - which with 6,000 participants last year holds the record for the most natural redheads gathered in one place - has been held since 2005.
Redhead Days attracts natural redheads from more than 80 countries including Great Britain, the United States, Australia and Germany.
Its founding is credited to Dutch artist Bart Rouwenhorst, who decided to paint 15 redheads and then advertised for willing models. He fielded over 150 responses and thus, a tradition was born.
Through the years, the festival has grown in popularity, each one breaking the attendance record of its predecessor.
There's usually music, fashion shows, art exhibitions and a huge picnic – where redheads of all shades - ginger, auburn, carrot, strawberry - are the only people in sight.
Until now, the Redhead Days festival has been able to operate thanks to crowdfunding campaigns, the work of volunteers and help from the community.
Red hair is caused by a gene mutation known as MC1R and affects only 1% - 2% of the world’s population, with Great Britain claiming the highest concentration in Europe. Some 13% of Scots and 10% of Irish bear a reddish hue in their genes.
In an article about International Kiss A Red Day, which is celebrated on January 12, the Telegraph reports that after Britain, countries that beat the global average are Iceland, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Northern France and the Netherlands. Heading south, the redheads become scarcer. In Italy, for example they are just 0.57% of the population.
Citing the book Red: A History of the Redhead, the paper reports that “the Volga region in Russia has more gingers per capita than anywhere else in the world, bar Ireland.” Their ancestors the Budini people, “were noted for their fiery hair by the Greek historian, Herodotus.”
It's also well known that red hair is found among Ashkenazi Jews and, outside Europe, among Moroco's Berber tribes. Through emigration, redheads arrived to North and South America as well as South Africa and Australasia.
In the U.S, they represent between 2% and 6% of the population or as many as 18 million people, the largest number in the world. As a result, many cities organize their own events for redheads only and some have smaller versions of the Netherland’s Breda Redhead Days festival.
If you're among the ginger population, here's your guide to rallies and parades for natural redheads around the world, including Germany, Ireland, England, Australia, Brazil, and a number of U.S. cities.
