I went to the Tucson Desert Art Museum, which really is WAY 
more fascinating than it sounds. Their tag line (or maybe motto is a better word) is "Visualize history through art."
Because art people understand that humans record their history through their art, in all its forms - visual art, architecture, music, drama, 
the written word, the spoken word. And most of what we know about cultures and civilizations that may not have written their history 
comes to us in the ARTifacts left behind - the art, the architecture, the visual manifestations of that civilization and their culture and beliefs.
So the history of this region is portrayed through Native American art forms, and American paintings. In the first
exhibit, there were what I took as cautionary words by Edward S. Curtis, best known for his photographs documenting Native American traditional life and culture in 
the late 1800 to the early to mid 1900s. He wrote this caution to the presumed viewers of his photographs:"As an alien race, we should hardly presume to judge them [the Native Americans] wholly by our standard and not give them credit for their own customs and codes. They on their part consider some of our customs highly objectionable and immoral."
Gives one pause, doesn't it? A reminder to not judge what we see and read by our standards. To keep an open mind and open heart, and to accept what we see and learn as someone else's reality.
So keeping that in mind, I want to describe some of the more interesting aspects of the exhibits I saw.
The main permanent exhibit focused on the weavings of the Navajo, Hopi, and Pueblo people. In these cultures, Spider Woman was the patron goddess of weaving. Spider Woman taught weaving to the people, who handed down the traditions and the guidelines to each subsequent generation.
Weaving in the Southwest Native American nations dates back to about 800 Common Era. While men built the looms representing Heaven and Earth, women in these nations did the actual weaving. Certain colors were traditional: red for the female Earth; white for the male Sky; and black for the rain. The woven cloth was used as clothing, cloaks, blankets, saddle blankets (after the Spanish brought horses to the "New World").
Spider Woman taught that the natural world is not perfect and is not symmetrical. Therefore, designs needed to be balanced but not perfect. So the weavings have three major elements where the weavers focused on major or minor changes to ensure perfection was not achieved: transitions or variations in color, texture, and pattern.
One of the more interesting traditions is that the weaver would continue a line out to the edge of the woven object, rather than having only an inner design and a border. That line leading to the outer edge released the creative spirit and energy of the weaver, so that the artist weaver could then create another weaving. If this line was not included, it was believed that the creative spirit/energy of the artist would be trapped. I think most artists feel much this way about each piece they create, that part of their self, or their soul, is captured in each piece they create!
Foreign objects were often added to weavings - animal hair, feathers, even pollen. These objects were used to imbue the user with certain protections and attributes such as speed, strength, cunning, etc. Sounds rather naive, but think about our modern sports teams - most have names of strong and fast animals, presuming that the teams will somehow act like those animals and help the teams win. Right? In that light, including an eagle feather or a bit of wolf fur makes perfect sense. (And this is exactly what Edward S. Curtis was talking about.)
Weaving changed over time, and the history of the Native American people was irrevocably changed by the conquistadors. This part of Arizona was home to one of the oldest inhabited areas in the US, dating back to about 700-1200 Common Era. The various indigenous nations, including the Hopi, Navajo, Pueblo, Apache, and Tohono O'odham peoples, united to fight the conquistadors and the US military. Treaties were made, treaties were broken, and eventually the military decided to capture and deport the people who had lived in this part of Arizona and New Mexico (around 1863). This basically amounted to attempted genocide, because the people were rounded up and forced to march some 370 miles to an internment camp in eastern New Mexico. In Navajo history, this event is referred to as The Long March.
The people were imprisoned for several years. The armies and the remaining Spanish conquistadors burned the native populations crops and sheep - the same sheep whose wool was used for those beautiful weavings. The same plants used for dyes as well as food. It was a total scorched earth policy.
So when these people were finally released and allowed to return home, there was nothing there. No animals. No crops. Not even the homes they had left behind.
But people are resilient, and the combined nations of Arizona rebuilt their homes, planted new crops, and continued weaving. At this point in time, just after the Civil War, other fibers and synthetic dyes were imported and "donated" to the Navajo and other nations. So the colors in the woven objects changed. The fibers changed. And as more settlers came to the region, the Native American weavings became more valuable for use as blankets, wall hangings, rugs, and yes, saddle blankets. Trading posts were established, and merchants encouraged the Native American weavers to incorporate more European designs in the woven items.
So color changed, texture changed, patterns changed. Just as Spider Woman had taught.
In the 1920s, both the Navajo and Hopi people began to weave images from sand paintings, which previously were considered sacred and spiritual, not images to be made permanent in woven items nor used in household items. The change was made by a medicine man who was also a weaver, and thus he broke the taboo.
One of the parts of the exhibit that I found most fascinating - as in many cultures around the world, the swastika was used as a symbol of eternal life, the cycle of life, well being. When this symbol was co-opted by the Nazis, the united tribes of the Navajo, Hopi, Apache, and Tohono O'odham wrote and signed a proclamation renouncing the use of the swastika and making an oath to never use that design element again. As a Jewish person, I was just so moved by that decision by these people who were willing to relinquish a part of their culture and heritage once they learned that it was used as an emblem of hatred and prejudice. What a generosity of spirit! (And what a lesson for our modern times, as well.)
The museum doesn't allow photography in their exhibits, so these photos are from various websites. And if you want to see larger versions on the images, just click on each photo and it'll enlarge for you.
Okay, enough about the textiles.
The "American art" portion of the museum's collection featured the amazing photographs of Edward S. Curtis. If you haven't seen his photos of Native Americans, they really are incredible. The images celebrate the beauty and the culture of the people photographed.
And then there are the paintings. Wonderful paintings by well-known American landscape artists such as Cole, Moran, Bierstadt. Even a painting by Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot. But, well, these paintings were used to justify the concept of Manifest Destiny, which is just one more part of the colonization of the US by white settlers. And after reading about the Long March, I wasn't feeling sympathetic to the settlers.
The penultimate exhibit was called Desert Hollywood, and was all about the use of the desert and canyon regions of Arizona, California, New Mexico, and Utah used in movies and later television shows. Posters, film clips, actors' comments, more film clips - it really was a fun exhibit. This region was used as far back as 1930, in the movie "Morocco." Other movies include "Gunga Din" (yes, with Cary Grant!), "The Garden of Allah" (with Marlene Dietrich), more modern movies like "The Lone Ranger," and several sci fi movies like "2001: A Space Odyssey" and "Star Wars: Return of the Jedi." Oh, and Charlton Heston first in "The Greatest Story Ever Told" and later on in "Planet of the Apes." Yup, the Sonoran Desert is almost like a character in all of these movies!
Final exhibit - the Sawmill Fire. There was a huge fire that consumed over 450,000 acres of grasses, cacti (including saguaros), and other succulents, and desert trees like mesquite and ironwood. Joseph Labate, the photographer, wanted to document the destruction and rejuvenation of the desert in his photographs. Fortunately monsoon rains followed soon after the fire, and it was amazing to see how quickly the plants and earth sprang back to live after the devastation.
Whew! That was a LOT packed in one afternoon! I stayed until closing. Really.
This museum definitely is worth a visit! I joined as a member, and hope to get to their jazz concert next weekend.
Here's the link to the museum's website: https://www.tucsondart.org/
And their Facebook page (which includes some photos) is: https://b-www.facebook.com/pg/tucsondart/posts/?ref=page_internal
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