Audio Stop 736

NARRATOR: 

Spend a moment taking in this scene. Photographer Cara Romero captured this image at Indian Canyon, a site in the California desert that is sacred to the Chemehuevi and other local tribes.

CARA ROMERO: 

This is photographed at the entrance to the canyon.  It features Kiyanni Williams, a young boy from the Chemehuevi Indian Tribe, seated on a boulder.  And if you look to the far right back into the distance of the photograph, you can see the first light just hitting the mountains in the background.

NARRATOR: 

Romero produced this work for the 2019 Desert X Biennial, an outdoor art installation in California’s Coachella Valley. This was one of five photographs by Romero displayed on massive billboards along the #10 Freeway near Palm Springs.

In these works, Romero highlighted the vitality of the land. Here, Kiyanni plays a dual role – representing himself as a Chemehuevi youth while also evoking the spirits that populate his desert homeland.

CR: 

In Chemehuevi, we have a word which is Ivankurur, which means “those that are all around us” – that we’re all connected not only to the rocks and the animals and the flora and the fauna but to each other and to those that came before us and to those that are coming in the future.

And so that is what Indian Canyon evokes – is this idea of our ancestors, our spirit beings – whether they’re from the past or from the future – are here with us in the landscape.

NARRATOR: 

Romero’s Chemehuevi heritage shapes not only the content of her work, but also her identity as a photographer.

CR: 

We come from a tribe where our creator is female. 

And I think this idea of powerful Native women and the representation in photography is needed for our communities. 

It’s a very powerful shift – to have a Native woman behind the camera because you’re going to see beauty in a different way.

We were taught that we were allowed to take up space, to be loud, that we were strong, that we never had to hold back.