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Weekends through April 27 present an opportunity to absorb a beautiful and powerful exhibit at the Luna Gallery in San Juan Bautista.
The gallery hosted the opening reception on March 15 of photographer and documentarian Kirti Bassendine’s impactful Contemporary Indigenous Voices of California’s South Coast Range. Her accompanying documentary film was shown at Teatro Campesino that same evening. The gallery exhibit will run weekends through April 27.
Photographer Bassendine spoke briefly at the reception, thanking the Native American community members who took part in the work. Her project shares the opinions and sentiments of several Indigenous Californians from the Central Coast and Bay Area. Each focuses, from their perspective, on their attachment to the natural world.
Bassendine explained that tribal members have dispersed from their original home region to areas that offer a lower cost of living and now struggle to keep a connection to the land. In interviews done by Bassendine, they spoke of the challenges indigenous people face gathering materials for their cultural crafts. In the showing, each photo has a generous panel with the very personal, spoken words of the photo subjects. They talk about their desire to rebuild a connection to nature and ways of bringing their culture back through a stronger relationship to the land.
Jennifer Colby, president and artistic director of Luna Gallery and Eco Art Studio, told the reception that there would be several other Native American-related events coming soon.
San Juan Bautista Mayor Leslie Jordan welcomed visitors and expressed appreciation for the exhibit, which is built around several large portraits of contemporary Native Americans, including locals Kanyon Sayers-Rood, and her mother, Ann-Marie Sayers, who are both Ohlone tribal leaders.
Amah Mutsun Tribal Band Chairman Valentin Lopez then spoke about the exhibit. He expressed the sadness he feels when he is in San Juan Bautista. He said that although the town is known for the Mission San Juan Bautista, it is the place where many people from various California tribal bands died. For him, he said, it is not a beautiful place but a site of historic trauma that the public still does not recognize. He also acknowledged the recent discovery of many skeletons of native women at a house site just a block away in San Juan.
Lopez’s remarks shifted the evening to a more serious tone. He said it is time that visitors to the mission be told the whole story and that there be a full recognition of the violence and brutal treatment of the California Native American by the Catholic Church as well as the Spanish, Mexican and American governments.
Following Lopez’s talk, Bassendine mentioned that her documentary film would be shown after the opening and that she, Lopez and Colby would speak and invite questions from the audience.
Bassendine said her goal is to ultimately combine her portraits with the documentary films as a traveling exhibit so more people can hear from the Native American community of today. “It’s always been about land stewardship and how the land is part of their culture,” Bassendine said. “The project is really to uplift their voices and to share their knowledge and wisdom.”
Contemporary Indigenous Voices of California’s South Coast Range
March 15 to April 27
Luna Gallery
107 Suite B The Alameda
San Juan Bautista
831-623-2783
Hours
Saturday, noon to 4 p.m. (closes 7 p.m. every third Saturday of the month)
Sunday, noon to 4 p.m.
By Appointment: 831-623-2783
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