Met Museum Kicked Me Out for Praying to My Ancestral Gods

I was aware of the problem of looting but thought such prominent museums could never be complicit in these kinds of crimes.

Met Museum Kicked Me Out for Praying to My Ancestral Gods

Something about my rhythmic movement, silent and subdued as it was, set the guard on edge. One of the people recording the video told me that he found my danced prayer so powerful he was shaking.

FUNNY! SEE BELOW

ART & PHOTOGRAPHY

CAPTION: The 1491s. Left to right: Ryan RedCorn, Migizi Pensoneau, Bobby Wilson, Sterlin Harjo, and Dallas Goldtooth (photo by Elijah Benson)

Bobby Wilson Combats Indigenous Stereotypes Through Humor

The artist-performer’s career undulates, ever so gracefully, across multiple mediums and registers of generational pain, healing laughter, and Indigenous joy. | Erin Joyce

Between Two Knees performs at the Bagley Wright Theater (155 Mercer Street, Seattle, Washington) through March 26.

NOT FUNNY:

The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York holds over 1,000 illicitly trafficked artifacts, according to a new report by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists. That’s a devastating number, and it might only be the tip of the iceberg. For now, it seems that The Met is counting on the Manhattan DA to decolonize its collection instead of taking a hard look at its past and current acquisition practices.

“Seated Uma from a Group” (c. 11th century), bronze sculpture from Nepal, Gift of Samuel Eilenberg, 1987

1,000+ Objects at The Met Linked to Antiquities Smugglers

A report by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists revealed hundreds of works once owned by people accused of or convicted of antiquities crimes. | Rhea Nayyar 

BETTER NEWS:

Winnemem Receive Major Grant for Salmon Restoration

A BIG WIN FOR SALMON

Special message from Sacred Land Film Project Director Toby McLeod: I have some great news to share.  On March 7, the California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW) awarded the Winnemem Wintu Tribe’s nonprofit Indian Cultural Organization a $2.3 million grant to carry out salmon restoration projects over the next 18 months. Work will be funded to: 1) plan to bring pathogen-free wild salmon back from New Zealand, where they were exported from the McCloud River more than 100 years ago; 2) create a volitional fish passage around Shasta Dam; 3) build tribal capacity; and 4) support government agency efforts to reintroduce endangered Winter Run Chinook salmon to the McCloud River.  Over the last three years, I was asked to be the New Zealand Project Coordinator, so I am thrilled to have participated in achieving this great success for the Winnemem and the salmon. The Winnemem Wintu Tribe, the California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW), and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) National Marine Fisheries Service will sign a Co-Stewardship Agreement on Monday, May 1 at 1pm, at the McCloud River Campground south of Mt. Shasta. The full title of the historic document is “Agreement and Co-Stewardship Framework for Reintroduction of Anadromous Salmonids in the Tribal Cultural Landscape of the Winnemem Wintu Tribe along the McCloud River Watershed.” Emergency measures during the summer and fall of 2022 led to CDFW, NOAA and the Winnemem Tribe collaborating to hatch 40,000 fertilized eggs in the cold water of the McCloud River, with 1,600 juveniles trapped downriver and then released into the Sacramento River. Plans are under way to repeat this effort in the summer of 2023.

I’m reading Bill Astore:

Dwight Eisenhower on the Cost of Permanent War

Ike’s Cross of Iron Speech, 70 Years Later

excerpt:

Let’s take a closer look. A conservative cost estimate for one of the Air Force’s new “heavy” strategic nuclear bombers, the B-21 Raider, is $750 million. A conservative estimate for a single new fighter plane, in this case the F-35 Lightning II, is $100 million. A single Navy destroyer, a Zumwalt-class ship, will be anywhere from $4 to $8 billion, but let’s just stick with the lower figure. Using those weapons, and some quick Internet sleuthing, here’s how Ike’s passage might read if he stood before us now:

“The cost of one modern heavy bomber is this: a modern brick-veneer and reinforced concrete school in 75 cities.  It is five electric power plants, each serving a town with 60,000 inhabitants. It is five fine, fully equipped hospitals. It is some 150 miles of pavement. We pay for a single fighter plane with more than 12 million bushels of wheat. We pay for a single destroyer with new homes that could have housed more than 64,000 people.”

Well those stories are definitely worth a peek…. XOX LARA/Trace

I’ll be back with more soon.