¡Colores!; Interview with Rina Swentzell Part 2

I don't know if we can. Well, we're going to try one more time. OK, we're back. And you're doing it. But like, I had this thought, the way you were expressing it, with the Chaco in general, and everything in general, and full of probable bonito in particular, how do you see probable bonito as a piece of art, as a piece of architecture? Like, just simply, what are you saying? I am saying that it probably, quite well, bonito was not probably built by one person with a big dream or a big statement about who they are and how full of ego they are, anything of that sort. But simply that, people were moving around that land, knowing it so well, and becoming a part of that place.

And where they came from and who they are, we do specifics, we don't know. But we do know that they left a trace of their energy that they were of the breath, that they were breathing at the time. I think it explains a lot, especially, you know. Is there anything that you feel like we should have said that we didn't, about public and retail, that kind of? No, just that frustration that I always have with, people trying to pinpoint it in terms of numbers and scientific facts and all of that, that trying to explain it in that way is always a little bothersome, but that doesn't need to go anywhere.

Right, and I think that we, I mean, we address that kind of. Well, just in the way that it's not, I mean, you said, I think you said it's not about calculations about, it's more about where you stand and you're watching. Good, yeah, okay. So I feel like that, I think that says it. And there's probably more. I think one of the main, one of the other main ideas that comes through from that time that Chockel was, in his glory, was that buildings are also living things. I talked about stones being alive, rocks, rabbits, but we also saw that buildings breathed and had life. There would be offerings put in the wall as structure for going up to make sure that they were well-fed. Houses even today still get blessed and fed. The entire village gets, you know,

the entire village form gets blessed and fed. And I think those are ideas that were there as part of the Chockel world, that they contain, you know, because they contain that opening into the, into the breathing, a breathing place was put into them as well. And so those were breathing live structures, not even structures. They were living and breathing beings, and they were treated as such. Why weren't they just, you know, I've made any away if they weren't. They were treated with some respect, and that's, and that's one of the message is to treat everything as it is in the life being centered, being. Would you say that brings me back to thinking about the way

that it might have been built over time, like some people talk about that place being very sacred in a way, because, and people open to do it in particular, they've found, like, ritualized burials of people and macaws even, and they're very wealth, there's a lot of wealth buried in those. And then you were talking about how there's just building on top of each other, so could you maybe address how people of the Mito evolved over time? Why do you think it evolved as it did? Why did it? And it certainly did, because it started out, which is a few small buildings at one time, and then it would, it would get added onto,

it was evolving through the generations of people. There was, I think, just again, going back to that thinking that there was a consciousness, I was shared by the group. The individual has a center, as a center, so does the group, and so the group has its own particular kind of sensibility that it shares with itself. And it's different, Santa Clara's sensibility, and it's a way of doing things very different than a son of Poncell three miles away, and acknowledged as a different place by all of us. I think Chaco also had that, that there was Pueblo Bonito, but then you had even further differences, like what was happening out and starting to happen, that Mesa Birdie by the time Chaco went down, there were, they're distinctive all by themselves,

but that doesn't mean that one is more sacred than the other, and that term sacred, of course, is another word that takes us in a certain direction. It means that if this place is sacred, or if that person is sacred, now it doesn't take away the sacredness or specialness of, and I think that's what sacred always does, is it an exclusive kind of term? So then not to use that? Well, I don't know if you use it, I guess you can use it, but they are just, I just like thinking about it in terms of, you being as sacred as I am, you know, that one key, that one Pueblo being has a special, not a little bit special as the other,

and that each has its own direct connection to the clouds, to the thunder. Yeah, that we are distinctive and yet all very special. And something distinctive and special, sorry, I didn't know. And that's okay, go ahead. Some people say that the self, is it self-eastern, or self-western, kind of view of I love Nito was intended to be impressive, and I think that's where the mounds are. All those big platform mounds. Yeah, I do think that there was like, you know, we talked about temple, but maybe kind of being something that middle place, the center that you spoke about, being kind of like a symbol of something or an intention

for to remind us to be in our centers and something. And so do you think that Pueblo and Nito is a, was intended to be impressive? I think it was, and you know, we've got, and that's where this idea of simultaneity comes in. We've got ideas coming in from Central America, and there were temples, and they were the focus of those temples, which is a sky. Very sky-focused. All the energy moving up into the sky. We have the non-sick blue or the opening into the earth. They're going straight down into the earth, and our movements, our movements, all those movements. But what happens if you do take that notion of simultaneity, you can have both working at once, and I think those temples, on, I call them temples, those platforms

that were around Pueblo and Nito, and also the altar place over behind, Jetro-Kettle, just a few yards away, and that wonderful space between the two of them, a couple of thousands of people that they needed to. Those were, those were places that I think were, were used very much like Central American Plaza temple areas, and you have both of them, and you can, and I think that's why we can understand a little bit about what happened with Pueblo's here after the Spaniards came in. Oh, isn't that an interesting thought? We'll try that on, too. Sure, you build a church over there. Hey, yeah. Let's see what you're thinking. Let's see what this is about. It is to be able, it's not that, again, we're back to being exclusive or, or say, hey, I know you, you've thought this out,

and you're legitimate, however, whichever direction it goes. I think Chaco had a lot of that, a lot of that, you know, contradictory from this point of view, ideas going on. And I think that's part of the thing that makes Chaco so fascinating because it was holding more than one view at once. More than one single. We like to think of places as having one single point of view. This is about that. Chaco was about this. One thing. But no, I think they were doing, they were doing just what comes naturally. Hey, yeah, come on, guys, let's play with this. Let's see how it all works together. And I think there was a lot of Central American influence, no doubt about it, and Chaco, but there was always that at the same time,

that other real way of thinking that grew up on the slam in this place, which was very different than what happened in Central America. But isn't it exciting that they both came together, Chaco? And it's interesting. How would you say that they'll build over time? Like, it seems like there are layers. There are layers, yeah. And this building itself, what probably would need to be build generation after generation and expressing a form. Aren't they expressing that? That very thing of who are we right now? What are the sensibilities that are? What energies have we given ourselves to in this 25 years since that thing has started? Here's where we are now.

Here's where we are. But there's still a connection. There's like a consciousness of people moving because it's a land. And the energies of the land holding the whole thing together, holding the people, holding us all together. And almost, actually, you know, we never had a God. We never had a superhuman, we never wet that direction. It was always the natural world around us. And if we took a breath, we took in that natural world. And of course, the world around us changes constantly. The weather changes. But there's always a constant there too. We're always still capable of breathing the wind that blows and feeling the sun that comes up. So how is that in architecture with the layers? With the layers, I guess what I'm trying to say is that here you start with some roles of buildings.

And the grandkids take it up and take it further out. But they begin to see that, no, this is by itself. And when we're creating art, aren't we doing that? If we give ourselves to the materials and the time and all the other things that are going on, don't we begin to feel, oh, we want to go that way? It wants to do that. Working with clay. Oh, it wants to do it that way, so you go and do it. And I think that's the common thing is it wants to do that. And so the next layer of things, as people look at it, would say, no, it's going that direction. Let's keep it going. And then more of it begins to reveal itself when I was doing pottery with it. It was that way.

Oh, it wants to go out more. Let's take it out more. It wants to do this now. It won't look nice if it had a straight line of front. And it also does this at the same time while we're doing that, point it to the where the sun comes up. Follow the path, because you're aware of that, without having to say it. You're aware of all of those, all of the movements in the sky. And the changes in the wind, where the sun is coming. If you have to live in it, why are you intensely aware of that? Really part of it, then. OK, so that was like a big jump to get something extra. But I feel like we can stuff like that. It's nice and warm. You need to get something extra, just do that.

You need to get something extra, just do that. You need to get something extra. You need to get something extra.

You need to get something extra.