VANISHING
UNVANISHED
SURVIVANCE
The images in this project grew from a discussion with students about how pictures can lead to beautiful truths – and ugly distortions – about the people we photograph.
This led to a conversation about the work of Edward Curtis. As he worked from the late 1890s to the late 1920s, Curtis thought he was recording the last Native Americans. He named at least one photo “The Vanishing Race.”
This belief was unfounded. But Curtis’ photographs contributed to the narrow perception about what authentic Native Americans look like. Hollywood later reinforced many of these stereotypes.
One student suggested a photo approach that could “Unvanish” her and other Native Americans, by showing some of the realities of their lives in the early 21st Century. That conversation sparked this project and led to a photographer-subject dialogue that asked:
- What do you want people in 100 years time to see about you and your life?
- Who would you like to be photographed by?
While we cannot eliminate photographers’ biases or cultural points of view, we hope to contribute to a more collaborative model of photography that helps consider Native communities aspiring to more than just unvanishing or surviving. There’s a Native writer, Gerald Vizenor, who came up with the idea of survivance, which he defines as, “. . . more than survival, more than endurance or mere response; the stories of survivance are an active presence … an active repudiation of dominance, tragedy, and victimry.”
In the words of my friend Prof. Sven Haakanson: “I’m not interested in preserving our culture. I want to repatriate knowledge created by thousands of years of my people learning to live on this land. For example, I hope our Alutiiq language doesn’t just survive, but also continues to change and adapt to the world. We want to live in the presence of our culture, not in memory of our culture.”
I hope that you will share your thoughts and suggestions for making this project even more useful, beautiful and honest, as we continue photograph, listen, and engage.
– Torsten Kjellstrand, SOJC Professor of Practice