There are days when we feel our age more than others, like today, when a trickster spirit has sent the whole of the day derailing into chaos and caprice.
But such feelings are no longer confined to single days; they settle in for weeks, months at a time now. As though climate change were not enough, as though the over Nazification of the colonial culture were not enough, this year has brought us so very many additional ills, chief among them the unchecked raging of a global viral pandemic — unchecked here at home courtesy of craven political cowardice and a willingness to make sacrifices of our peoples in service of selfish colonial interests.
Same as it ever was, since the first invaders arrived, and yet in its way, so very much worse: partly because of the population explosion and expansion in the centuries since, and partly because this time around? It’s all so needless, and therefore heedless. The dominant [colonial] culture had months’ worth of warning that it deliberately ignored, and subsequent scientific evidence on how to control and prevent its spread that was just as deliberately jettisoned for the express purpose of making people sick. Certain people, that is: populations like ours that are not merely considered expendable, but whose deaths are still actively sought half a millennium and more after the first colonial invasion.
And on top of it all, winter is already here.
This is the season when we know we need strong hearts and brave spirits, even at the best of times. This is a harsh land, with extremes of temperature and weather even in drought, their wild polar swings even more pronounced in this era of climate change. We know that it will be harder than ever this year, with such a panoply of dangers arrayed around us now on all sides.
But in these times of prophecy, we have gifts granted specially to help us now. We have the benefit of lived experience, of ancestral memory, too, and together they create wisdom for those who seek what they may teach. It’s a gift that comes to fruition mostly in the latter half of life, when we have had sufficient experience of our own to place the lessons properly into context.
And it’s one reason why our cultures teach reverence for our elders.
Yes, we have to guide against our thoughts and spirits becoming hidebound, too set in our ways to learn, too wedded to the past of lived experience to be open to new, better, or at least necessarily adaptable ways. But today’s featured work reminds us that age is not as limiting as we fear. Yes, our hair may become dusted now with gray, faces lined, joints aching, feet slowed from their more youthful pace. But there is knowledge, experience, passion, too, all tempered by the wisdom to use it well: snow on the embers, a fire in the heart.
This work reminds us of the beauty of our elders, of their wisdom and grace and the knowledge they hold safely for us all. It, too, reminds me of winter, of snow upon flames — the rich reds of alabaster turned pink and marbled by cool white matrix. From its description in the Other Artists: Sculpture gallery here on the site:
Master carver Ned Archuleta (Taos Pueblo) works in classic Pueblo fashion — with the stone, not against it. The result is an iconic form of a Pueblo elder, wrapped in the traditional blanket and wearing an eagle feather. Pink alabaster mounted on cedar base. Sculpture stands 13-1/4 inches high including base (carving 11-3/4″ high; base, 1-1/2″ high); carving 5 inches across at widest point by 1-5/8″ deep; base 5-7/8 inches cross by 3.5 inches deep. All dimensions approximate.
Pink alabaster on cedar base
$375 + shipping, handling, and insurance
Weight requires special handling; extra shipping charges apply
This is one of only two or three remaining pieces in our inventory by Ned, who walked on earlier this year. He did not have as much of a chance as he deserved to experience life as an elder, but his legacy lies in his work, and it still has much to teach us.
His carvings of traditional elders have always been among his most beautiful, spirit-infused works — equal parts talent and skill combined, an attention to the tiny details of tradition, and that nameless something, that magic that occurs when a master puts his talents to work in the service of spiritual beauty and power. This is one such piece.
For the moment, it sits inside our home, not left alone in studio or gallery. It feels as though the spirit it embodies watches over it, and us, with beauty and wisdom and strength, with the power that comes with long experience of a life lived well. And it reminds us to honor our living elders now: those with snow on the embers, a fire in the heart, and lessons for us all in building a better world.
~ Aji
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