¡Colores!; 513; One Who Stands In the Sun: The Art of T. C. Cannon

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no, I don't know, I don't know, I'm fake a title, I don't know, I'm fake a title, I don't know, I'm fake a title, I don't know, I'm fake a title, I don't know, I'm fake a title, I don't know, I'm fake a title, I don't know, I'm fake a title, I don't know, I'm fake a title, I don't know, I'm fake a title, I don't know, I'm fake a title, I don't know, I'm fake a title, I don't know, I'm fake a title, I don't know, I'm fake a title, I don't know, I'm fake a title, I don't know, I'm fake a title, I don't know, I'm fake a title, I don't know, I'm fake a title, I don't know, I'm fake a title, I don't know, I'm fake a title, I don't know, I'm fake a title, I don't know, their hearts, and you see them rustling leaves of their forests and burning. You see their flaming selves turn to ashes as a shooting star's death, and they are no longer a part of the cosmos, but merely dust on your brow to dust away

and vacuum from the rug like the dust of all people who never find their own hearts. T .C., 1972. Well, T .C. was a cow on my side, and on his mother's side, he was cattle. Born September of the 27th, 1946 in Lotton, Oklahoma, and was raised around here in Grace Mountain. His name was Spiderman Gidey, that's an Indian pronunciation. It means one who stands in the sun. He lived the Indian life, the Indian way of life, and he was proud of that name. And since he was a little boy, he started, you know, painting with crayolas, you know, and he's ever since then, you know, after he kept, you know, every year, well, he does be sketched something, or

I don't know where he got it from, but it just, maybe we'll just end him. I know one thing, he was a, when he read something, or went to school, he got straight eight, he was straight eight student. When he was just a little boy, when he was about three, you know, about the third grade, his sister was a little higher, about a couple of grades higher. Well, she'd get hooked up on a word that she couldn't pronounce. And he was just a little guy, and he could, he'd spell it, and he could pronounce it for her, you know. If I just take a load that several times, you know, but that, Tommy was very emotional. And a little thing would hurt him. And, and he wouldn't forget it, you know, there's a lot of things, you know, but he had a premonation of death. It, I read a piece in a, that he wrote when he was going to high school of here at the Gracemont, that he would, his lifespan would be short. He'd tell his friends, all his friends, or like a Santa Fe, and

sensual state that his lifespan would be short. And maybe, maybe this, you might want to know about this. I took him to Lawton to catch a bus with Sherman Chalson. They were going to Santa Fe. I, I, I, out there to go to school or art school, you know. I was sitting there after I got back watching television, and I was sort of staring at his, his high school graduation picture. And all I want is a little light appeared on there. It wasn't a light exactly. It was kind of a glow. I thought it was the biggest dime when I noticed it, and it just kept getting larger and larger, you know. Pursuing that almost covered the whole, whole picture, you know. So this lady from Norman, I mentioned it to her, and she said her father -in -law knew something about stuff like that, you know. So she's, I'll ask him and let you know. So, about six months later,

she called me up and she says, I got some news for you on that light you saw. I said, well, I'll be up and see you. And I went on and drove on up there and she said, he told her that it was a spiritual light. No one could see it, but one person. And anything he did was be, would be good. And, and he would be well -known. And that's all come to pass. It just pains to, to me as a Native American, makes me feel like he was one of the, one of the gods of art. The color she used, and his brushstrokes, there was one I saw, a guy had like purple hair. I thought about what was cool.

When I look at his word, I feel proud. I mean, I feel, I feel some some kind of energy from his words that makes me, makes me want to be more than I can be because a Native American making it in today's society makes me feel really proud to be a painter. But I wouldn't try to paint like what he did. It kind of makes you think, well, I take it one step further, you know. But yeah, it does things like, wow, I do came from here. That's cool. Different junk man, different junk, spend some money. Up until the 1930s, formal institutions at Del with the American Indian Art was clearly directed toward a conservation and preservation approach.

I had a feeling that the future of Indian Art is going to come out of young people who can make an intelligent linkage with their cultural heritage and find their way as members of a contemporary society. And I think since that time, from the early days of the institute, we found that young Indian people, indeed, stand with a foot in two worlds. They want to be a part of the world as they sense and feel it. And I think they have high regard for their own Indian cultural heritage, but they don't want to have to rehash it. The real shocker for me was when I thought of art going to an art school, I thought you're going to be a painter probably. And I never thought of music

or drama or ceramics or sculpture. The artist is one who should be given total freedom. I mean, there were things that I hadn't done before. For example, a stone piece and used paint on it actually, say, like some oil paints on marble, you cannot jam Indian people into your idea of what an Indian should be. And that a good educational process is the one that allows them to encourage the same to work that out. Tradition is not necessarily a remnant of the past carried on and on. I first

met TC, I think, in 1965. He was very popular among the students and staff, just because of the, just a personal aura that he had. It's hard to kind of define it. He was fascinated by art, fascinated by ideas. He got into the deep philosophers like Nietzsche and so forth. He and I had a very, very strong like for Bob Dylan. He was very intelligent. And that intelligence just ate up anything he could read. He was the only one that got in our art history class out of 30 students in that class. I mean, I remember him pouring over a book of Victorian furniture because he was wanting trying to paint a chair in a particular painting of his and he wanted it to be exactly the way that it should have been. So he was studying Victorian

furniture. There was a new vision of Indian art, which really was a product of the institute. The new vision I would characterize by people like Fritz Scholder or T. C. Cannon, Bill Sosa, Alfred Jungman, because these people saw that they had a whole new vocabulary that they could use in expressing themselves in art like Mom and Papa have it going home to Shiprock Blues, that the T. C. was doing. Basically, why that's such an terribly important painting is because, first of all, he used the big broad color fields on which to put the images. Secondly, that the images don't even, they sort of seem to hang in space. After that, none of the students or the faculty or Indian art in general ever looked at

Indian art the same. This Mom and Papa painting was sort of done near the end of the stay at the institute. When after being at Woodstock and after being at New York City, he was able to come back here and he put all these new pop idioms into his works. The neat thing about it was that these images that they saw in New York were so minimal that they sort of a generic, but when they were put together with the tribal images, the images from back home, now then they sort of became their own. I think T. C. at that point in time was like all of us. We were somewhat disillusioned with the establishment, and I think T. C. was caught up in the belief that, you know, gee, maybe we can make a difference, maybe we can make the world a better place, and we really believed it. We thought

we could do it. This is a song made for T. C. when he was in Vietnam. It's a war song. February 12, 1968. Benoit. Dear Bob, this country has really been on fire during the last 13 days. We fought for a day and a half right outside the headquarters here. We killed about 600 of them. Then for the last few nights, we haven't been getting too much sleep because of the VC mortar and rocket attacks. Right soon, your brother, T. C. Both of our tribes are based on warriors' societies, and we discussed that a lot of times. He was very impressed with the Black Lagoon Society, even as the young age, and being exposed to that, and around an darker or more warriors are honored all the time, and I think he wanted to become a warrior

just like I did. We started, so what if he got killed, and I'd say, but it'd be just a good day to die. Dear Bob, we killed 105 last night and lost only six. I killed my first VC yesterday, and I see no formal way of saying, well, young man, you have earned the Genocide Award of 1968 for killing the most people in the shortest time with as little effort as possible towards our goal of total annihilation of the sectarians that dwell in our neighborhood. What a myth. Someday, I'll probably be assassinated by a Republican Indian, T. C. It affects all of us that have been through combat. He asked me that, how many guys are you killed? What do you want to know for a team? I just want to know, man. I said, well, six, I know of six, you know, that I might run face -to -face and killed, you know. And I said, why? He killed

two, you know. I said, the body man is a body, and he said, that's a kid's name, you know, war's war, and I got to kill or be killed, you know. It's I know, man, but sometimes I still see those those guys faces, man, you know, even though they were sappers, you know. I said, well, they were to kill the Gen, man. James of Mobile, I once saw a young man like you. He was smiling in the triple canopy jungle. The balance of power on that particular day blew his brains all over us and the Asian ferns. The cells of his children, the blood of his mother, the waste of America, made all of us children whimper. We cleaned our guns. He was like

no one I had ever met and to this day I've never met anyone like him. Just had all the warmth and gentleness that I look for in an individual. And certainly he was a striking man. But he had this sense of humor that I just love. But in the same respect, I didn't know him, and I still don't think I knew him because he still, he just is the type of person that is, he had so much going on inside. To me, he was just such a thinker. Everything had a purpose. When we were in Santa Fe, he had his first show there and he wanted to do all these things. He got canvas and turned it into a big stretched hide, Buffalo hide. TC decided to serve at this opening concoction called Punk a Punch, which was basically equal parts of grain alcohol vodka and grape juice. And he had a great big bowl of this big punch bowl of this stuff sitting on this table. And so people came in and they started sipping the punch. And in about 15 minutes, the noise level in the room was just, I

mean, at an all time high. And about 45 minutes after that, the place was empty and the show was sold out. And then he'll be sketching some things. And then it's like, God, we're eating. I always tease him. We're eating now. Just enjoy your lunch. Is it like manulita? I have to get this down on the book. If I don't, then, you know, I would be so sorry. A dream of a great breath of Indian art to develop that ranges through the whole region of our past, present and future. Something that doesn't lack the ultimate power that we possess. I'm tired of cartoon paintings of bambi -like deer reproduced over and over. From the poisons and passions of technology arises a great force with which we must deal. I once

stood hoping for three days, watching and working on one small line until it afforded me the perspective of a beautiful woman's cheek. Now, his draftsmanship is impeccable. I compare him to people like Mike Langelor and Reddiel Sarto. And then you don't expect to see alt -teeth necklaces or you're not expecting to see an Indian couple sitting listening to Tosca. Let me say that an Indian painting is any painting that's done by an Indian. Today, however, I really don't think there is such a thing as an Indian painting. People don't call it work by Picasso, a Spanish painting. They call it a Picasso. I have something to say about experience that comes out of being an Indian, but it is also a lot bigger than just my race. He had a tremendous sorrow for

the plight of not only his tribes, but all of the Native Americans in the process of the development of these United States. And so he wanted to celebrate the Native American. When I look at some of TC's paintings, and especially those that are show the very traditional Indian man, what that just jumps out at me is saying that we are still here and we have not changed and we're eternal. He wanted to make statements about what was glaringly wrong with human beings and the human condition in general. And I think he wanted to make those statements in a positive way. He had more an attitude of somehow we've all got to figure out a way to try to live in harmony with one another and not get into this situation of whoever has the most guns and the most money wins. And

he simply observed on the stupid things that we do to each other and why do we do these things? I don't think he claimed to have any answers. Other than the obvious one of why do you do this? What do you gain from it? And in the long run, none of us gain anything from it. There is a strata of Romanicism in almost all the paintings, more poetics than politics, universal human ingredients of joy and grief, predicaments that are of enough merit to keep up the constant vigil of being mortal. One of my favorite paintings is

a painting that TC did of his grandmother pregnant with his father. The reason I like it is because it's very positive. The idea that we're given a task here, hopefully we'll make it a little bit better than it was when we got here and we will instill that attitude in our offspring and, you know, the millennia from now it might be a pretty nice place. On some specific blue purple cloud of some intensely burning theology, beyond and above the river and hills, muddy and red both, vilded precious in eye and heart, strides in moving angelus, a woman of sun and blood, a lady of willow arbor modesty, a woman of sand plumb blossoms, a lady of small hands and big skies,

a woman of the eternal breath of life, a maiden of the eternal circle, a specific angelus of some intensely burning theology. I mean, I went back to Santa Fe at 95 miles an hour, got to my home and my wife Sam came out and she was in tears and I said, is it TC? And she said, yes. When I got home and called that guy, he said, then the marshall at Gracemont tell you, I said, no. He said, well, your son got killed in the car accident. I dropped the phone. I couldn't take it. I grabbed my wife and told her what happened. For me, I'm not sleepy and there is

no place I'm going to. All I know is that you, my friends, will be far away when I die. None will see my final grimace of pain and smile of diamond clinched teeth bones on that final bed of sand and cactus. Out there, where it gets lonely in the early summer rain. He was one of the most worthwhile people I think I've ever met. It was just unbelievable that he had gone. And of course, one of the things that just hit me after thinking about it for a few minutes was that he said, yes, he was going to die young. And perhaps if this is what he believed, maybe that's why he got so much accomplished. And he's short to stay here on earth. I always tell my kids about him, you know, about who he was. I get a friend who was to me and

how he bailed me out of jail once. I think maybe one thing that I want to do is thank him because he opened up another world for me. But I'm also grateful on a broader sense for his talent. And I think that's done a lot for the Native American people and for people in general to take a second look at things. So for that, I'm grateful. I read a piece in a paper that he says, I wish I would go

down in history. And he's going down in history. He's getting to be known. They knew him better in Germany than they did here in Oklahoma for a long time. I figured he was worth getting in there. There was waiting period of 15 years. So they call him and they said that if I furnished everything, furnished money and everything and bust and everything, they'd make an exception and put TC in. So that's how I got him in. And I'm proud. I'm very proud of him of what he accomplished and mostly for being my son. I don't care if he did do anything. He's still my son. I loved him. There I go getting emotional again. I hate that. And pretend that

he just doesn't see. The answer my friend is blowing in the wind. The answer is blowing in the wind. We're a copy of this colores program sent $35, which includes shipping and handling to K -N -M -E -TV, 1200 University Boulevard Northeast, Albuquerque, New Mexico, 8 -7 -102, or call 1 -800 -328 -5663.