- Growing up on the reservation rests at the
very heart of who you are as a human being.
It informs everything that you are going forward
in life.
My tribe, the Chemehuevi, have lived here
in the heart of the Mojave Desert on the California
side of the man-made lake of Havasu.
I came from humble beginnings and I created
with what I had.
Look at Aunty.
That's still at the heart of where my photography
practice is at.
Look at me, Helena.
At the University of Houston I took my first
black and white film class.
I was the only Native American and everybody
around me was completely unaware that we existed.
Helena's so cute!
And I knew almost instantly that I wanted
to be able to communicate visually, through
photography, modern native life.
With a photograph you get one frame to tell
a story.
And so how can you create a story that communicates
as much as you possibly can in one moment.
That was where the invention for me of creating
these staged photographs came from.
It's a blend of absolutely traditional photography
and a modern photography technology to tell
the stories and create the images that I wanted
to create.
It's photography with a painterly approach.
- Identity is very critical in Cara's work,
like in the piece titled Naomi.
It's a modern woman who is clothed in tradition.
- So Naomi is from a series of 'First American
Girls', and it is a play on 'American Girl'
dolls.
We built a life-size doll box.
We designed the doll box to be very modern
indigenous.
Naomi is Northern Chumash.
So this is her dance regalia.
Her headdress is white dove and goose feathers,
as well as her dance sticks that she's holding.
You have a beaded belt with abalone hanging
down.
California has one of the most brutal colonial
histories in all of America.
This is a way to create visibility for those
things that are still here against all odds
and to be a powerful story of resilience.
- There's such a vibrancy and a playfulness,
almost, in this piece, down to her fabulous
pink pedicure.
- It has a really great California vibe, right?
I was asked to participate as one of 25 international
artists in the Desert X Biennial.
I had an idea of how I could ground people
in Southern California that they were on Indian
land.
And I thought wouldn't it be wonderful if
four little mythological characters came back
to visit Coachella Valley and responded to
the landscape?
I didn't have a lot of time to turn around
six billboards, but we did it.
The boys are all four cousins, they're my
nephews, and so I think that there was a great
power in them all being time travelers from
Chemehuevi.
What I do is just like the old film days.
I edit down so you'll see that there's thousands
of them.
These are some back scenes of the little boys.
And then I'll take them into Photoshop and
I've already set them up.
I have a few of them here.
This is where it starts out.
And so you can see if I pull these layers
off, we start with just those three images.
This is the left and the right, and then there's
that center piece.
And from there I end up distorting and pulling
and brushing the layers back and forth so
that you get one complete, cohesive image
across that big panoramic.
Then I start playing with color, getting it
just right.
I wanted this to have an antique look.
I was going for that mid-century feeling of
Palm Springs, that mid-century brown and blue
feeling that I ended up with.
Photoshop is just liberating, that's where
you can really take it and include things
like magical realism and supernatural in everyday
life.
That's what really interests me about using
Photoshop to actually communicate indigenous
worldview.
- Come in, let's go in.
- Coming in.
- Hi.
- Go on, go on in.
- Come on in.
Today the boys are gonna be doing a continuation
of Jackrabbit, Cottontail and Spirits of the
Desert.
I am recreating feather bundles.
It's precolonial dress and a very, very old
style.
We're bring them back for these photographs,
because the little boys carry the spirit of
the ancestors with them.
You look handsome, look good.
Three...
Four.
Last one.
Are you guys good?
- My name's Kiyanni, his name is PJ but we
call him Curtiss.
John and Winka.
- [Interviewer] And tell me about what you're
wearing?
- We're wearing the Indian stuff.
- [Interviewer] And why?
- Because we are?
- Remember how we did this last time?
Okay, everybody's gonna put their left foot
forward.
Do you remember your left foot?
Okay.
You're gonna line up right behind him.
Come back here, come back here.
The concept this time is we're gonna do a
piece that provokes the viewer to think about
that famous Abbey Road image of the Beatles.
But we're gonna have Chemehuevi crossing with
the great wild Mojave Desert around them.
You're walking that way.
Point your feet that way.
Look that way.
Keep looking that way.
Perfect, you guys.
What comes through in a lot of my photographs
is that Native Americans are still very much
alive, and that our indigeneity emerges in
modern times.
Okay, look that way.
- It's important to let the non-natives know
that we are still here.
A lot of people, I go out and I say I'm Chemehuevi,
and they don't know who we are.
So now that we're expressing it thanks to
Cara.
- Chin up, PJ.
- She's bringing us out there into the open
world.
- My photographs are really meant to empower
our youth.
I want them to know how powerful they are.
How all of that spirit and ancestry lives
within them.
Diego and I have a blended family.
Diego has three older children that are out
of the home, and Diego and I have three children,
15 years old, 12 years old and six years old.
So much of what I create is for the children
to give them insight into who their mom is,
and to my heart.
I like that one.
Do you like that one?
For a long time I wanted to create a portrait
with my father.
Too tight?
- Perfect.
It's important for my dad to let people know
that he is a Navy veteran.
I know by him wearing his veteran's hat, it
really frames what era he grew up in and what
made him the man that he is today.
I like that last one.
It's beautiful.
- It's just been amazing to watch Cara blossom
into the artist that she has become, that
eventually will go on to outshadow us all.
