¡Colores!; 1701; Notable New Mexicans 2006

You This project is made possible in part by New Mexico Arts, a division of the Office of Cultural Affairs and the National Endowment for the Arts. He took on challenges that no one would take on. You can see in my dad's work the power of the medicine. Our culture really came out in what he was doing.

He was a man of elegance and style. From his way of dressing to his way of playing, nothing was wasting. Maria is timeless. When people see her work, they think of this part of the world and this part of the world really has become O'Keefe's country, her territory. Notable New Mexicans, next. There was this incredible cloud in the sky. My dream again has come true. Meaning a tone to speak out, to be heard. To speak out, to be heard, to be heard, to be heard. It's always a stimulant for me to come up around rocks like this

and see where the hundreds of years ago had recorded a lot of things that we don't understand. You always have that spiritual feeling when you come up here. Because these people were like myself. Being in myself, I really respect what's been done here. One of the big things that I feel too when I come up here is just looking at all the different forms of rocks that makes me want to bring my sketchpad up here and just play with a lot of organic formations that nature has sculpted through the years. I think that this is what really thrills me. Like a lot of people who can come and walk through the air or drive through here and order to sell, there's some rocks, a formation of rocks. But with me, I see deeper than that. I always thought that stone was part of the air and coming from people that feel that they're part of the air.

I always think of something that's going to last forever. New Mexico was the homeland of our patches, the Chiena, the warm springs, Chiracawa. I think being here really brought something out in him that I'd never seen before. We moved here in 1962 and then we'd all go down to our homelands and warm springs just south of here, about 225 miles. And there's something about the place. My grandfather was born there before he went to prison with Geronimo. And you can see in my dad's work the power, the medicine. Our culture really came out in what he was doing. When Ellen was a small child, his family, his mother, especially, would tell him stories about tribal ways, traditions. So he liked to learn what people thought and how they lived. When I was growing up, I remember seeing a lot of Indians on the street

in the small towns in Oklahoma. It looked so exciting to see these men standing there and maybe on the street corner like this with their big hats and beaded bands. And so proud looking at the bands on their sleeves here, beaded bands here, and then proud. At that time, when people almost were afraid to be recognized as Indian because the way Indians were treated, well now they're getting the feeling that it's good to be what you are and I'm proud of being that particular tribe or whatever and picking up some of those old traditions that were just about lost. And I've tried in my women and children as well as men and tried to give them a lot of dignity. He loved the fact that he was an Apache

and that he came from a very powerful group of people. But as he went into his artwork, he gave the world something that I guess no other Apache ever did. He bought this place, he said I won't make a sculpture garden so that people can come in and see what my ideas about my people were so they can get the idea that we're all the same. You know, we have people that come in and go down to my sculpture garden and they can sit there and keel out there. You hear them a lot of times. I said, why are you with me?

I say, Alan, it's almost like a church. I've grown the love of what life is all about. It begins to think as you're older. You must be here for some reason. And this is a lot like you would refer to as having on earth. She makes the area such a part of her imagery that it really becomes an aspect of O'Keefe country. In other words, when people see her work, they think of this part of the world and this part of the world really has become O'Keefe's country, her territory.

And she did that, I think, very deliberately because she was so profoundly appreciative of the landscape in this area. She really felt it was part of her being. She came out to find Ghost Ranch in 1934. She had heard about it through a friend who told her that it was the best place on earth. O'Keefe was told she could remain the summer and she claimed Ghost Ranch then and there as her own. As she was surrounded there by the painted desert, 360-degree views of the painted desert. She woke up in the morning, it's the first thing she saw. She took long walks in that area. It's the last thing she saw at night. It was sort of a seamless existence for her. She could live in the landscape that she adored and that she wanted to paint. As she said, she was surrounded by her colors and her palette. It was this great, sparse landscape.

And the house also looked out at her mountain, patronol, which she said God told her if she painted enough, she could have it. And she painted it a lot. She really liked being alone. And Ghost Ranch, especially in the 30s, was physically removed from even the small society that was happening in Santa Fe and Touse. So the house had everything here at Ghost Ranch. It was more isolated from the rest of the ranch community. Several miles away from headquarters. It had patronol, it had the desert. She could walk out the door and be in the middle of what she loved. But she still had relationships. Orville Cox, the driver of Ghost Ranch, became one of her favorite drivers because he knew the land. Maria Shabot told me that it's believed that Orville Cox took O'Keefe to the black place. Ghost Ranch, especially in the 30s, because of the dust bowl and the drought,

there are a lot of bones here. And the bones were just strewn everywhere. When the cowboys at Ghost Ranch learned that O'Keefe liked to paint the bones, they began to bring them to her. They would recognize usually a skull that they had given to her. And they would tell stories about the animal that had become the skull. It was just the surroundings called out a different part of her. And from what O'Keefe wrote and said, this was the place that was truest. You know, there was a resonance between O'Keefe and this place. And she liked who she was here. She had a studio at Ghost Ranch. But she wanted as little between herself and the landscape.

She hiked constantly. She had favorite trails. She told a friend that she called the cliffs at Ghost Ranch her curtains. The landscape and the physical attributes of the landscape were part of her home, probably if she could have lived without a roof and walls she would have. O'Keefe was part of a tradition of artists who came to New Mexico to paint and to find inspiration. But what's unusual about her contribution is that she made this part of the country a very definite spot on the map. It's ironic that O'Keefe's fame also meant that thousands and thousands of people all over the world became aware of a place called Ghost Ranch, a mountain called Paternall. And I was very interested in the landscape, the first time I came to New Mexico, because I thought that most of her New Mexico pictures were made up.

They were invented. And so I was so surprised to come and see that the colors, the contours, it's all of the aspects of her painting are very much a part of the reality of New Mexico. So I think that once you understand that about her work, you really realize that she is visualizing New Mexico in a way that makes other people appreciate it in a much deeper way. When I was in junior high school in Verelos, I walked up to Senator Chavis' campaign offices and I was surprised to see this figure who was introduced to me as Senator Chavis. I was, of course, intimidated and he gave me spare change from his pocket, which I wished I had kept, but I was poor and had to spend it. I remember distinctly his stopping to buy a paper from a little boy and he was cold. And daddy took one look, went into Stombridge, bought him a jacket, came out, gave him a jacket.

Good grief, there's so many beautiful memories of my father. Senator Chavis always seemed to be anxious for people to get an education. And that stemmed from his own lack of opportunity. He used the facilities that were available to him, the public library as a public place of learning. He began to study people, Washington, Jefferson, Jackson. Those were all very important and key later on. Not only I don't think they were just philosophies, I think they were ways of living. Senator Chavis was adamant that there be an America for all Americans. And that meant from the very beginning that people were protected in their rights as Americans. And Dennis Chavis, I think, more than most, really heard this call to become that voice of the American people who felt they had no voice. Knowing that one could achieve that high level of government position was very important, it made us hopeful.

He felt for people, any underdog I don't care if you were a blue-green or yellow. In 1938, he begins to pursue activities around civil rights sounding legislation in terms of employers. When the Southern Democrats decide that if they begin to open these doors to folks and for them it meant African Americans, that the next step would be if we open jobs to them, then we'll have to give them our daughters. He surprises the Southern Democrats by going at it on the first day of the session and creates a filibuster that lasts several weeks. But the fight continues in the Senate in different ways. The language that you see in the 1964 Civil Rights Act is really the language developed by Chavis. Workers shall not be excluded because of race, creed, color, nation of origin.

My father was a brave man, not talk about physical bravery, but he had a brave heart, talk about a brave heart. He took on challenges that no one would take on. In 1950, the Senator decides that he has had enough of the McCarthy Committee hearings which were supposed to help root out Communists. On May 12, 1950, the Senator goes to the floor and gives a very dramatic speech. Chavis stood up on the floor and said, no, thank you. And as he said that in that speech, he was attacked repeatedly by McCarthyites. And he answered them with great grace and with the old-fashioned decorum of the Senate. But he was always right there and he was always exactly right. And he just simply refused to be anything other than an honest-to-gotter American who believes in freedom. He would take on the biggest and the roughest, yet he was a gentle person.

Chavis is an ardent constitutionalist, a constitutional patriot who truly believed that show trials, kangaroo courts, and Congress had no place in American society. That what was really valuable was the Constitution, was the Fourth Amendment, the Fourteenth Amendment, and all due process amendments. McCarthyism completely cut that out. And Chavis is a real American hero because he refused to let it stay out. He thought of himself as Dennis Chavis, a good person, trying to do good. And he was comfortable with kings. He was also comfortable sitting on the steps smoking a cigarette with a little lady. Maria is timeless.

It is through the cycles that we are here on this earth that we hopefully inspire generations ahead of us and live in harmony and peace. Pottery was an everyday occurrence for her. It wasn't something she did every now and then. And she was never without a song. She had this calm sense about her, which extended beyond the family, and she was always a generous lady. Lady is the name that she was called by all the poor blue people, and she was called Guillaume. Little did we realize that when we were growing up that she was actually a very famous person.

With the advent of the Santa Fe Railroad in the 1880s, we started to see a decline in what we call traditional pottery making, the large pots and bowls, especially the Oyes. And that was because of the introduction of commercially made goods. And she told me is to remember. To remember all the things that I see around me. To remember things that I've heard, things that I've seen, things that I have read, and to always be open-minded with people. She was very influential in the arts this way. And Maria really brought back the old traditional style of pottery making with the larger pots. And because of what she was doing and the magnificent beauty of the pieces she was working with, an art work that was really created. So I think today we really have to credit Maria for keeping this traditional life and turning it really into an art form.

Maria inspired a number of young people to continue making pottery in particular her son and her grandchildren. But she started out with a collaboration where there has been Huleon. And she was a master at making the pots and polishing them. And then Huleon would paint the designs on them. When they started making just black pottery, which was already being made in both Santa Clara and in Santa La Fanzo, they experimented a little bit. And that's how they came up with this kind of black on black technique, which is a matte design on a highly polished background. They were one of the first people to travel. They went to St. Louis for their world's fair. With that they opened new roads for native people and that they weren't afraid to travel. That they weren't afraid to interact with different people other than their own. And they were ambassadors from our Pueblo and ambassadors from the Indian world.

From the Native Americans perspective, you know, it led to a better way of living for our Pueblo. The artists there could now be able to earn a living from it and they were the initiators of this particular movement. I think without her pottery world would not be where it's at in this modern day and within my own lifetime as well. And with that thought, you know, I just hope that my children continue. And their children's children continue because this is the legacy she left for us. What was told to me and I think a lot of other potters at this present time is what my great-great-grandmother had stated once. We all come from the clay the earth and we all will return to the clay the earth.

So it's up to us to continue and be happy and continue to harmony of what we can express through our hands and minds and heart. And it is through the arts and our ceremonial life that we will live on forever. And our piece is called a day in the government. Well, John Lewis was very proud of being from New Mexico and he would talk about it, the music he heard, the people, and the way of life. But I think that he had a basic respect for all people. He never kind of descended to anyone. He was the consummate gentleman. I've never met anybody in class here. He was a man of elegance and style. From his way of dressing to his way of playing, nothing was wasted.

He ignored critics. He did what he did. The Mount of Jazz Quartet became our favorite group in those years. It was my entree into jazz because I came from a classical background. And when I heard what he was doing, I understood his roots in terms of classical music and it made a whole lot of things make sense to me. John Lewis was one of the first people to really look at the idea of combining the Western European classical music world with the improvisational world of jazz. And the modern jazz quartet did a bunch of that using Bach as a basis of improvisations. And of course Bach was an improviser, so that's nothing new.

But it was new to people's concept about jazz. His compositions all had this sort of simplistic clarity to that translated. I think actually got inside a lot of folks had that maybe they, if it hadn't been for them, they wouldn't have picked up on jazz. What I'd love to say about John is that in addition to the modern jazz quartet, which is where most of us know him from, he played with everybody. He played with Sonny Stitt and of course Miles Davis. And Dizzy Gillespie wrote wonderful stuff for Dizzy. And he played with even Stan Gatz. And he played with Ella at one time. He was the quintessential accompanist. He knew how to create all types of unbelievably imaginative backgrounds and things that would make it easy and comfortable for you to play.

John made everybody else sound great. And not only was he always on time, he was always in time. And by in time, I mean, he was the ultimate swimmer. He knew how to just provide the exact right thing for the right moment. His presence was so clear of such ultimate belief in the music and the clarity of it that just that alone made you play in balance. He would just look over at it. If he taught us anything else, it is of the singular importance of the blues to American music. He was always telling me it's like when you go fishing with these blues riffs and ideas, you catch a fish and you might have to throw it back in the water, but you just keep fishing till you find a good one. And when you find a good one, you say, well, I'm going to keep that one. And with him, that was the way he used to develop his thematic material in his solos. He'd get a nice blues riff going, po-tododododododoododoododoododoododoododoodoododoododoododoododoododoododoododoodoododoododoododoododoododoododoododoododoododoododoododoododoododoododoododoododoodoododoodoododoododoododoododoododoododoododoododoododoodoodoododoododoodoododoododoododoododoododoododoodoododoododoododoododoododoodoododoododoododoododoodoododoodoododoodoododoododoodoododoododoododoododoodoodoododoododoododoodoododoodoododoodoododoododoododoodoododoodoododoododoodoododoodoododoododoodoododoodoododoodoododoododoododoododoodoododoododoodoodoododoodoodood

the entire band from memory by name. Let me tell you something, that wasn't a, that's not an easy feat for somebody who just comes in the conducts of musicians. They don't play with every day. And that type of concern that he showed for the communal part of the music. And the well-plannedness music together, and every man is important. That's something that I always take with me, and that's an important part of our music. I love it. He was a great man. I love it.