A community of which we are a part has lost two members in the last two weeks, and I’ve learned we are about to lose a third. All too soon, especially the last.
Loss is new to neither of us; we’ve both had more than our share, from early on. December included a couple of other painful markers us, and there are more to come. With start of a new year, the subject of loss has led me to reflect on the notion of legacies, of what we leave behind: individually and collectively, personally and culturally. Each of those described above either has already or will leave significant personal legacies in their respective cultural milieus.
It is the job of the living to recognize and respect those legacies, to honor and nurture them and ensure that they grow.
Our cultures are set up for that — unusually so. But as with everything else, forced assimilation has a way of diluting its impact and effects. It requires a daily effort, a concerted one, to keep those ways from being lost in the frenetic shuffle of contemporary life. And sometimes, we have to remind ourselves to stop and see what’s in front of us, see its relevance to our pasts, its potential impact on our children’s futures.
And so it was with this piece, newly acquired.
Even at first glance, it’s a legacy piece: one that links long past with distant future, ancient ancestors with children of children of children not yet born; one that links the original peoples of this land across thousands of miles of distance and culture and tradition, into one historical, anticipatory, fully contemporary sacred hoop of life.
The Sacred White Buffalo, of course, is itself originally from neither of our traditions, yet we recognize its import and celebrate its existence, both real and symbolic, anyway. I wrote about it in one of this blog’s earliest posts, as part of a reflection on what concepts of independence, treated with facile, mercantile celebration by the dominant culture, mean for our peoples:
Originally, of course, the symbolic meaning comes from the peoples of the Northern Plains — specifically, the peoples of the various Sioux Nations. It is an integral part of their cultural and spiritual traditions, and is rooted in an ancient prophecy given to the people by White Buffalo Calf Woman, a spirit being who brought them a the sacred pipe of the same name, and brought them hope in time of genocide. [Note: There is actually very little on the Web about the symbolism of the white buffalo that is not utterly inappropriate, in every sense of that term. Most of it is written by non-Indians appropriating stealing the sacred stories and symbols for their own fraudulent self-promotion, and you will never see that sort of sacrilege linked on this site. But for a contemporary view that bridges both science and the sacred, written by a Native author, go here.]
Today, like that of Bald Eagle, the symbolism of the Sacred White Buffalo has been adopted as an intertribal symbol: in this case, of indigenous independence. Tribal nations all over the continent honor the symbolism and find hope in it, even where it is not a part of the a particular nation’s historical culture and traditions. This is certainly true of Southwestern peoples, for whom Buffalo (ordinary buffalo) still plays a central role in traditional lifeways and foodways. And so many of the artists whose work we carry pay homage to this magnificent and powerful animal spirit, adopting the imagery in painting, sculpture, drum-making, and other art forms. Wings sometimes uses Sacred White Buffalo turquoise and white buffalo magnesite in his silversmithing.
It was written in the context of featuring one of the items in our inventory — a traditional Pueblo hand drum, one painted with the visage of the Sacred White Buffalo at the Four Directions. [A hand drum, I might add, that we have since removed from inventory as part of Wings’s personal and artistic protest against Zuni Pueblo’s acceptance of blood money from a racist billionaire.] At the time, I noted that, like the white buffalo, the very existence of the drum itself formed its own legacy to our peoples:
A footnote: In many parts of Indian Country, the contemporary existence of the drum is itself a symbol, a manifestation, of Indian survival and independence. At one time, the federal government “outlawed” the drum and its use, as yet another way of suppressing our traditional cultures, yet another means of forced assimilation and colonization. Yet another manifestation of the U.S. government’s “Indian Policy,” which, in its polite form, was rendered “Kill the Indian; save the man.” In its less polite but no doubt more heartfelt form, it was “The only good Indian is a dead Indian.”
The drum is still here. We are still here.
And we shall remain. We know this now, where perhaps in bygone days it was not thought to be a sure thing. But it is knowable today only through the legacy we have been left by those gone before and the great sacrifices they made for that purpose.
When an indigenous archetype finds form as it does in this piece — in a stone of such natural beauty, art in and of itself — it becomes something wholly different, and much greater than a version painted in acrylics. Standing atop a substance that we also hold sacred — a finely oiled natural chunk of red cedar — it seems a tangible incarnation of a legacy stretching back through time one hundred, one thousand, ten thousand years and more.
The piece itself is by Jeremy Gomez (Taos Pueblo). We’ve featured Jeremy’s work quite a lot recently. He’s a young artist, up and coming, and over the years we’ve watched him hone his talent and skill with hard work and precision. His work shows steady growth; he and it have both evolved artistically and he’s coming into his own as a mature artist.
He is distantly related to Wings; his uncle, the late Emerson Gomez (whose work we’ve also featured here), was a distant cousin and one of Wings’s closest friends. He was also a master carver, one who specialized in a very traditional, quasi-vintage style that was, to us, at least, instantly recognizeable and very much his own. Jeremy has shouldered his uncle’s legacy and carried it forward. That is not to say that their styles are identical; they’re not. But they exist along the same spectrum of style and tradition, and it’s very clear where Jeremy learned his skills and earned his talent.
And now, he’s taken that legacy and added to it, made it fuller, and he in turn will leave it to those who someday learn from him and follow in his footsteps.
For us, it’s a blessing to see work in Emerson’s tradition continue, in new, exciting, beautifully skilled ways.
When he called about this piece, whether we would buy it was still an open question. It’s larger and more valuable than the work he’s done for us in the past, most of which falls into the “miniatures” category. The white buffalo is small in relative terms, but it’s a full-sized sculpture, not a fetish. He wanted a little more for it than what we really wanted to expend right now.
Wings asked me what I thought. I told him he should look at it; if he was meant to buy it, he would know.
He bought it.
Jeremy had expressed a willingness to lower the price; he’s young, and relatively new to the art world, and his work is not yet mainstreamed. When you have to earn a living with your art, it often leaves you feeling that you have no choice but to let go of the work of your heart and soul for less than you know it to be worth.
Wings told him not to compromise. “You’re an artist,” he told him. “Your art is worth what it’s worth. Don’t let anybody tell you it’s not. Stand strong; don’t ever let anybody try to force you into backing down from asking what you know is its value.”
That’s a legacy, too.
~ Aji
[Note: I had intended to have this sculptural piece already posted in the appropriate gallery, and linked here. Somehow, given today’s topic, linking it doesn’t feel right. I’ll add the entry there later today or this evening; anyone interested will know how to find it, or how to find me.]
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