#karuk

“Out in the Klamath Mountains of northern California, fires are rushing through the underbrush, lighting everything they touch between the trees ablaze.

However these aren’t a danger to the rich hardwood forests, they are deliberately set by the Yurok and Karuk tribal nations—as a wildfire prevention strategy of all things.

As strange as it might sound to literally fight fire with fire, it’s something the tribes of these mountains have done for at least 1,000 years according to oral tradition.

Low-level and controlled burnings are in fact an ancient and successful forest-management practice. A cleared forest floor and less fine fuels such as leaves and ferns, makes it more difficult for wildfires to ignite and spread.

Wildfires have raged across California over the last half-decade, and out of these ashes sprouted a partnership between the U.S. Forest Service and the tribal nations of the Klamath Mountains.

In 2018 they began collaborating on the Somes Bar Restoration Project to use traditional fire techniques to safeguard 5,570 acres (2,254 hectares) of land covered in white, black, and tan oaks, Douglas fir, red fir, and madrones on steep slopes...

Long shot as I haven’t been an active tumblr ndn, but my cousin passed away recently and left behind his wife and young child.

Karuk Louis Vuitton Drum 1.1 (with beater)

Fox Spears (Karuk)

louis ceitton bandoulier bag parts, abalone beads, pewter beads, artificial sinew, wire, elk rawhide, cedar. 19.5” x 15” x 3.5”

“This drum, inspired by traditional Karuk double-sided gambling drums, incorporates monogram canvas and leather handles sourced from a used Louis Vuitton Keepall Bandoulière 50 bag. While conceptualizing the drum, I considered reports by 19th and 20th century non-Native ethnographers that referred to an emphasis in Karuk culture on the accumulation of goods like dentalium shells, woodpecker scalps, and obsidian blades, as wealth-building. These items were collected as a signal of high social position, where the wealthiest were afforded the most respect. Some English-speaking Karuk would refer to the wealthy as the “good people.”

My choice to incorporate a luxury designer object into the making of this piece references these past traditions while helping to bring an imagined post-colonial future into reality. I purposely embarked on a modern day “hunt” to capture a Louis Vuitton bag on Ebay, and then processed it into materials for my art-making. I sought out a pre-owned bag that would have lived its own unknowable life before it came into my hands, and I thanked it for its service before making my first cut.