Greetings! I know some of you follow and read my blog entries for the wet collodion process stuff. This entry should be of interest to you.
I want to do an introduction to my new body of work I hope to complete in the next couple of years - or however long it takes.
The work doesn’t have a name right now, I’ve been calling it “Sacred Red Earth”. That will more than likely change, but for now, that’s what I call it. So what is it?
We moved last year from the Denver metro area to the mountains of Teller County, Colorado. We have 12 acres here on top of a mountain mesa. It’s a gorgeous place. It’s full of wildlife and all kinds of flora. The diversity here is incredible.
This was home to the Ute Indians for a very long time. They have all kinds of sacred places and objects still on the landscape today. That’s what my project will be about; sacred landscapes and objects.
Specifically the sacred rock formations (think Garden of the Gods) and something most have never heard of sacred trees. These are called “Culturally Modified Trees” (CMTs). There are prayer trees, medicine trees, navigational trees, etc. All of them were modified by the Ute people. They served different purposes, but they were all sacred or special to the indigenous people. These culturally scarred trees are of several different types: (1) the Peeled Bark, or Medicine Trees, (2) the Bent or Prayer Trees, (3) arborglyphs or Message Trees, and (4) burial markers or Burial Trees. In deference to the Ute Nation, I will use the terminology that my Ute consultants use. Their lexicon generally refers to the different trees by functionality. (Marilyn A. Martorano)
I’ve recently talked to John Anderson. I would consider him to be the leading expert (other than the Ute Elders) on these CMTs here in Colorado. Or at least one of them. I told him my interest in including these trees in my work. I still have a lot of research to do but I feel good about the direction. He invited me to go on a hike in September to look at some of these trees in the area. I’m mostly interested in the trees in my local region (Teller County) where I live.
A big thanks to John Anderson for answering my questions and turning me onto great resources for my project. You should check out his books on Amazon and watch his Ted talk here:
Images from Colorado Open Space Alliance Conference
