Los Dos Corren Juntos (The Two Run Together) Revisited #2
31"x20"
Modified Acrylic Paint on Art Board
2005
The Chumash People
The Chumash are Native Americans who once thrived in southern California from an estimated period of 650 BC to the mid 1700s when the Spanish missionaries took control of the area.
Samala Chumash wearing ceremonial dress of a shaman. 1878 (left) Map of Chumash country with present day names from The Rock Art Paintings of the Chumash by Campbell Grant
 
| Introduction
I was sitting out on my porch in Santa Barbara, California on a star filled December night in 1993 and as I gazed up at my old friend Orion, I could not help but notice a tiny little cluster of stars off to the right. They were twinkling back and forth, some barely visible.
A few days later those little stars spoke to me again, but in a way that I would have never expected. I was at the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History in the room devoted to the Chumash Indians. While there, I came upon a life sized diorama of a group of Chumash Indians participating in a ceremony. I saw the back of a figure who appeared to be a shaman or high priest. When I walked around to see his face there they were! That same little group of stars… the seven sisters…the Pleiades… painted across the entire left side of his face!
The early Chumash watched the movement of the stars closely. They also produced some of the most glorious paintings ever made. Their canvas was rock. And not just any rock. The places chosen always had a special connection to earth’s elements of earth, water, air and fire. Their true meaning can only be speculated upon but it is clear that they emerged from the spirit of a culture who desired a greater understanding of themselves, the world they lived in and worlds beyond.
What started as a whisper has since manifested into a collection of art that celebrates the magic of historical discovery. I welcome you to share the experience.
Patti Ortiz
The Harrington Papers
John Peabody Harrington, ethnologist and linguist, was born on
April 29, 1884, and died on October 21, 1961. His prime interest was
in American Indian language studies. This interest grew into what would
become an obsessive quest to collect all linguistic data and cultural
history from the Native American tribes before they were lost to
modernization.
He was extremely protective of his findings. After his death, most
of his field notes were found stored in warehouses, garages and other
caches up and down the West Coast. The Smithsonian Institute has since
been collecting and archiving his writings and recordings. To date,
there are 95 reels of microfilm of his documentation on the Chumash
alone.
John Peabody Harrington in the Field, 1927 Photo from December’s Child:
A Book of Chumash Oral Narratives Collected by J.P. Harrington Edited
with an Analysis, by Thomas C. Blackburn
The Narratives
Harrington acquired much of his information through interviews with
Chumash elders. The interviews took place during a time that the old
ways were becoming obsolete. The stories and Chumash language itself
would have been lost had Harrington not documented the narratives on
paper and in audio recordings.
Chumash Elder, Fernando Librado Photo from December’s Child: A Book of
Chumash Oral Narratives Collected by J.P. Harrington Edited with an
Analysis, by Thomas C. Blackburn
|
