westernartgirl
luckygrrrA “Burning Controversy” Around the Bonanza Map
Talk about a “burning controversy.” A comment from a Trading Posts reader this week prompted us to take another look at a famous map in our collection that is perhaps one of the most widely seen in history. The map is of the Ponderosa, the Nevada property where plot of Bonanza, one of the most … Read more
A New Saint for an Ancient People
The Vatican’s announcement on Dec. 19, 2011 that Kateri Tekakwitha, a seventeenth-century Native American woman, has been cleared to become a saint was, for Joann Samon, as well-received as the miracle cure attributed to Tekakwitha of a boy afflicted with a flesh-eating bacteria in 2006. Samon, who is of Dine, Yaqui and Hopi descent, is … Read more
Tere Romo and a Seven-Year Quest for Art Along the Hyphen
Updated Jan. 10, 2012 — As much as Domingo Ulloa’s painting Braceros has become a symbol and one of the most admired works in the Autry’s current exhibition Art Along the Hyphen: The Mexican-American Generation, there was a time when its very existence was little more than a theory. The large canvas, which depicts a … Read more
Language as Something More Than Just Words
When they get noticed at all, they’re the supporting players in every Thanksgiving play or pageant. Rarely, if ever, do we hear them speak.
But the Wampanoag — the Cape Cod Indian tribe that famously helped the original Pilgrims survive in the New World in the early 1600s — use their own long-unspoken words to make a powerful statement in Anne Makepeace’s new documentary film, We Still Live Here, showing at the Autry on Sunday.
Roberto Chavez Maintains His Sense of Humor
Probably my favorite artist in the Autry’s show Art Along the Hyphen: The Mexican-American Generation (part of the mammoth Getty initiative Pacific Standard Time) is Roberto Chavez. The six artists show a range of styles from frankly abstract to realist to surrealist. Chavez, 79, falls largely in the representational, figurative category, though there is much … Read more
Dia de los Muertos the Way They Do It Back Home
This year’s ¡Vivan los Muertos! celebration at the Autry, on Saturday, will carry what you could call a Oaxacan seal of approval. Rogelio Santibañez Arellanes, cultural promotion director for the state government of Oaxaca, Mexico, was on hand all this week as a consultant to help guide the celebration. “I come to make the offerings … Read more
Michael Heralda: Passing on a Native Philosophy Through Stories
Michael Heralda found his life’s vocation in a dusty book bin in a yard sale 17 years ago. But he is neither author nor bookseller. He is a storyteller and a philosopher for our time, fostering people’s understanding of what is and is not authentic in the modern world. “The key to remember is that … Read more
An Interview with Louie Perez of Los Lobos: Evangeline’s Long Road
Louie Perez gets a little flummoxed when he reflects on his partnership with fellow Los Lobos bandmate David Hidalgo. “I’ve been writing songs with David and the band for forty years!” he said. “That’s kind of scary.” Perez chatted with me ahead of the Autry’s presentation this week of Evangeline, The Queen of Make-Believe, an … Read more
Dora De Larios: Sculpting a Mexican-American Identity
Most days, you can find Dora De Larios at her happiest in her Venice studio, surrounded by vases, plates, plaques, sculptures and even giant totems, all of her own making, in various states of completion, and made from stoneware and a variety of other materials. De Larios, one of the six artists featured in the … Read more
George Sanchez: Disentangling Mexican-American Identity
George Sanchez believes those who try to “protect” their culture from “attack” or “invasion” — as immigration restrictionists do today and as Chicano Power warriors tried to do in the sixties and seventies — are like a thirsty man trying to catch water with a sieve. In other words, they fight a losing battle. Sanchez, … Read more
