Our Voices, Our Land (Northland) Photographs by Stephen Trimble & Harvey Lloyd, Words by the Indian Peoples of the Southwest Reviewed by José M. Gonzalez Article rating: 4.38

In 1983 the Heard Museum in Phoenix, Arizona opened a continuous exhibit featuring images of Southwest Native Americans, with their voices, thoughts, music, and cultural art. The award winning audio-visual exhibit was compiled into a book published in 1986 with the photographs of Stephen Trimble and Harvey Lloyd; accompanied again with the quotes of the Southwest Native Americans that had went with the exhibit.

Our Voices, Our Land is a visually and emotionally stunning compilation of American photography. The purpose of the exhibit was to document and delve into the cultures of the peoples of the Southwest without interceding white American cultural values into the piece.

In this aspect both the exhibit and its accompanying book are a success. Both Trimble and Lloyd capture the land, its people, and their culture in their natural beauty without bias, exaltation, or recrimination; a style which is a running theme in their other works.

The landscape photography is shot in all its majesty and simplicity; from faraway shots of lonely and imposing mountains to light waves of sand, dry cracked earth, and flowering cacti. The book begins with place. Where do these cultures and people come from? What is the setting for their tale? This really pushes the reader into the mind of the people who live there. The use of triptych for the panoramic shots adds a graphic quality to the layout of the book.

The section on sustenance affords the viewer/anthropologist a midway point, or rather a connection between the land and its inhabitants. Vibrant photographs of plants, vegetables, corn, and the land with the words of Native Peoples highlight the importance and respect they have for the land.

Family, Community, and Celebrations, the following sections, are the most telling photographs from a cultural aspect; fabulous portraits of people in everyday activity, rituals, and celebrations, from the past and present, in color and black and white. The color photographs make the people come to life, while the duotone images highlight the activities that the subjects are doing, where color would detract from the action.

The final sections, Artists and Continuity, are both a testament to the history of the Southwest Peoples, in that, through their arts, they continue their traditions and hold to their customs. In these set of photographs one experiences not only the pride of these people, but also their turmoil and struggle to live in two worlds today; their struggle of thinking in two worlds. Trimble captures this brilliantly in his image of the Santa Fe Railroad during dusk. The Railroad symbolizes not just the movement of ideas and culture, but the middle ground between two separate worlds.

Our Voices, Our Land is a poignant look into the Southwest Native Americans through their eyes, in their words; through their past, present, and what issues they feel affect their future. The color photography is brilliant in texture, content, and subject. Coupled with the older black and white archival photography, the images lend the viewer a rare glimpse into another world, another way of life. One sympathizes with these American cultures and feels their pride and struggles. Our Voices, Our Land is a wonderful experience.

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