CPCP Catalyst Initiative : New Mexico

CATALYST INITIATIVE ROUND 2

Artist Rulan Tangen worked with Roxanne Swentzell of Flowering Tree Permaculture Institute, an organization focused on creating healthier communities through native culture and permaculture practices. Their work together focused on building a transformational ritual of appreciation, restoration, and renewal for community leaders, while highlighting intergenerational community support systems and mentoring. Their story together over a year of collaboration is one of recreating the patterns of nature, the concepts of biomimicry and seasonal rhythms, to nourish the body, mind, spirit, heart, and to help create sustainable lifestyles for women leaders who work tirelessly in their community.

New Mexico Center for Performance and Civic Practice

Corn beans and squash all work together to grow well. So maybe we need to help each other help ourselves. Feel good in community... Eat a meal together, massage, dance together. Also the seasons. There is a definite resting period in the winter when we don’t work so much outside but take time to add nutrients to the soil and rejuvenate it and let it rest to get ready for the next season.

You can’t plant corn in the same place over and over again or you will deplete the nutrients. You have to rotate your crops... put some legumes/nitrogen fixers in there. Let your soil rest so it can be even better the next season.

– M E N T E E A N D E V E NT PA RT ICIPA NT

Contents The Partners

4

The Project

8

The Event

14

Reciprocity 20

PARTNERS Rulan Tangen

Roxanne Swentzell

The Partners

Rulan Tangen’s work values movement as an expression of indigenous worldview, including the honoring of matriarchal leadership, dance as functional ritual for transformation and healing, the process of decolonizing the body, and the animistic energetic connection with all forms of life on earth.

As Founding Artistic Director/Choreographer of DANCING EARTH, she has recruited and nurtured a new generation of Indigenous contemporary dancers and holds the belief that “ to dance is to live, to live is to dance.

Roxanne Swentzell built her own house at Santa Clara Pueblo at the age of 23 while her two children, Porter and Rose, were still babies.

Growing up in a family of artists, builders and farmers, this only made sense. Although she built a solar passive house and had gardens and animals on her own, she was quickly inspired by a permaculturist (Joel Glanzberg) to put all the pieces together and create Flowering Tree Permaculture Institute using the house site as the home and experimental place in sustainable living systems.

Today Flowering Tree Permaculture Institute has expanded to many sites with different ingredients to play with. Roxanne, a renowned ceramic sculptor, spends her days making sculptures and going from site to site working on what is happening in each of the Flowering Trees places.

Roxanne loves to find new/old ways to do things.

She participates in her Cultural Pueblo Dances and community; loves being a grandmother, but privately wishes that she had three more of herself so that she could get more done in a day.

Flowering Tree Permaculture Institute (FTPI) is a non-profit organization centered on advancing Permaculture in our local communities. The Institute was created in 1987 in Santa Clara Pueblo, where we are still based. We began teaching classes on different techniques and methods to promote a healthy lifestyle, such as how to farm and garden in our high desert climate with low water use, how to understand microclimates, and how composting and seed saving are a part of growing sustainably. We also shared knowledge about animal husbandry, teaching the community how to take care of turkeys, chickens, ducks, pigs, sheep, fish, and even bees. We taught how to butcher, store and cook meats, shear sheep, spin wool, weave, milk, make cheese, harvest honey, and create aquatic ecosystems with fish and plants. Our educational offerings included sustainable building techniques, as well, such as adobe construction, mud plastering, straw-bale construction, solar energy, water catchments, and so on.

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Where and How It Began

R OX A N N E A N D R U L A N K N E W E AC H O T H E R , B U T they had not previously had the chance to collaborate together.

They felt that being a part of the Catalyst Initiative gave them the opportunity they had been looking to build their relationship and create work together.

Roxanne expressed a strong interest in finding a way to honor exceptional women who work for their communities and spend so much energy taking care of others. She and Rulan both voiced that hard work is highly honored and prized among these women’s communities and taking time for one’s self is something that is often not done.

“I hope these women know they’re appreciated and that the efforts they’re making and the energy they’re expanding is replenished. Often these women are taken for granted in the community because they are always working and serving others.

And those people wear out. I want them to know that ‘I see you’. And that they know it’s okay to be amazing women and still relax. That it’s okay to stop and nurture yourself.”

– ROX A N N E S W E N T Z E L L

As a dancer, Rulan creates work that values movement as an expression of indigenous worldview, honors matriarchal leadership, dance as functional ritual for transformation and healing, the process of decolonizing the body, and the animistic energetic connection with all forms of life on earth.

Rulan responded to Roxanne’s work of seed conservation, germination, growth and harvest by thinking about this project as following the rhythms and cycles of nature and considering in some way the catalyst to be the additions of self care they hope these women community leaders will add to their lives.

“I feel like for artists and changemakers and cultural workers, everyone is overworked, underfunded and in a stress mode.

Which negates why artists are invited to help in the first place.

Everyone goes over capacity and their leadership and artistry isn’t supported. It’s an unmet need.”

“Across the board [there is] reluctance to be able to take time for self care, people want and need it but find it impossible to get that funded by their tribes or job or to get that time off, even though it is crucial to sustainability.”

– RU L A N TA NG E N

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THE IDEA OF CATALYST + PROJECT

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The Project The idea of catalyst – in Native culture there is less value for innovative new ideas unless they have been tested for generations. Maybe this is in part due to colonization and a history of being gifted with beautiful warm blankets only to find out that by accepting them you had traded off sacred mountains, or those blankets were infected by smallpox. As a result, new ideas have been generally met with conservative response.

(This has shifted somewhat in recent years but in terms of the traditional culture carriers, there is less interest in innovation until it is proven beneficial and sustainable.)

However, a catalyst in the form of transformative ritual happens seasonally or more, with ceremonies that invoke rain or good crops, bring the invisible world into tangibility. For example, various practices such as sweatlodges or medicine ceremonies, even smudging, transform space and integrate earth and spirit realms. “This project design and implementation follows the example of Nature, through concepts of bio-mimicry, seasonal rhythms and organic pattern recognition. In summer we envisioned, in fall became very busy harvesting ideas and tested recipes, in winter we slow down and reflect, refine, select and deepen the story and purpose, and in spring we emerge with the ritual. It will have cyclical sustainability in that those selected have a track record of service.�

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SUMMER - CULTIVATION

SUMMER CULTIVATION

“In the summer we envisioned” “We’ve had some good seeding of material - we met and came up with the core material that will be shared.”

– RULAN TANGEN

Using Roxanne’s ideas as a springboard, they began to invest time and energy into conversations about the parallel effects of burnout on community leaders and artists alike; and the challenge of creating and maintaining sustainable lifestyles.

WINTER - LIE FALLOW

WINTER LIE FALLOW

“In winter we slow down and reflect, refine, select and deepen the story and the purpose” Rulan said that Roxanne’s work with indigenous food can be considered radical. In the pueblos, change can move slowly and traditions are highly guarded and prized. For example, amaranth and corn were traditional foods of the pueblos before colonization, but later the Spanish outlawed amaranth because they wanted the tribes to grow wheat. After centuries of wheat cultivation (and making of foods such as fry bread), the pre-contact traditional foods have been lost and a return to an indigenous diet is slow to take root, despite pervasive health problems in the community.

And perhaps similarly, the long-standing culture of constant hard work is pervasive enough that taking time off to care for yourself is something of a radical notion.

FALL - HARVEST

FALL HARVEST

“In the fall we became very busy harvesting ideas and testing recipes” “We’re looking at [...] how these things connect, seed cultivation which is connected to food which is connected to how we nourish ourselves not only with food but with thoughts and care. We’re looking at how not to talk about an integrated message but how to experience it.”

– RULAN TANGEN

Rulan spent time testing a curriculum as part of dance workshops she taught in several different communities during the fall. Elements included teaching modified movements for women with differing physical abilities and small relaxation exercises that the participants could do at home on their own, such as self massage.

SPRING - GERMINATION

SPRING GERMINATION “In spring we emerge with the ritual.”

“Our plan is for the spring - centering on self care for leaders, which is different from what we originally envisioned but we’re thinking of what will be the most impactful for our communities - taking care of the women leaders who do so much.”

– RULAN TANGEN

Intended to align with the spring equinox, Rulan and Roxanne planned a March event that would both honor and nurture the spirit of hardworking women community leaders.

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THE PROJECT

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THE EVENT

The Event A O N E - DAY R E T R E AT C A L L E D Nurturing the Source was held for elder women from both pueblo and nearby native communities intended to recognize their community leadership roles and to provide an opportunity for these women to take time out to care for their emotional and physical well-being so they can continue their work renewed. The retreat took place on Sunday, March 27, 2016 at Ojo Caliente Mineral Springs in northern New Mexico, a hot springs considered to be a sacred place of healing for centuries.

Rulan and Roxanne each nominated three elder women to participate, women who are leaders in their communities who also expend time and energy nurturing and caring for others. These six women were each asked to invite a younger woman, as a mentee, to attend with them.

Roxanne created handmade, hand-stitched invitations that were handdelivered to each of the elder women with the intention of showing that they are valued and that effort had been put out on their behalf.

All activities focused on appreciation and acknowledgement of the elders’ work, including a reading of their biography of accomplishments, awarding a gift of original artwork made by Roxanne, movement work led by Rulan, a shared meal in the resort restaurant, a soak in the mineral pools and mini-massages given by the mentees to their elders.

At the end of the shared meal the mentees were invited to write a message to themselves and to their mentors in cards, something that they want to remember to incorporate in their lives from this experience. These cards were kept by Rulan and Roxanne after the retreat and mailed back to the event participants around the summer solstice as a cyclical reminder.

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Participants self-care reminder notes

“I just want to remind you that you do not have to do everything by yourself.

Go take the time to reflect and be silent.

Take care of your body!�

“Do not think of the cost but think only of what my body needs. My soul will be nourished because I’ve taken the time to care for myself”

A F E W O F T H E M E N T E E S W H O AT T E N D E D T H E event are also dancers in Rulan’s company. In April 2016, the dance company toured performances to 21 regional sites. Inspired by the core values and positive experiences of the elders who participated in Nurturing the Source, Rulan encouraged her company to engage in several self-care activities that were implemented while on tour, including additional free days, massage, sharing of leadership, and healthy eating to facilitate a more sustainable lifestyle.

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“It’s an unmet need - some of the core values from the event got worked in self care and restoration.”

– Rulan Tangen “The emphasis on self-care during the tour really helped me to be more conscious of what my body was doing and less focused on powering through a to-do list.”

“It made me self reflect upon my own self neglect.”

“The little things we can do for one another is much as important as the big strides and leaps we take to reach our goal.”

– DANCERS/MENTEES AND EVENT PARTICIPANTS

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RECIPROCITY NEW MEXICO - 20

Reciprocity T H E S U B J E C T O F R E C I P RO C I T Y C A M E U P I N A conversation about cultural and community responsibility. These women leaders rarely ever ask for help, they try to be self sufficient.

But when help is asked for, there’s a cultural responsibility to saying yes. If you are asked by your community, you cannot say no. And often these female leaders are known as people who get things done, they’re asked to do more and they feel obligated to say yes. But now, communities are less reciprocal and when these women make an ask, they get told ‘no’.

In a similar vein, Rulan reflected on the experience that many changemakers and artists of color have when engaged by large, well-funded, majority-white institutions in conversations about best practices but who are not invited to take decision-making roles that could impact those practices. How often the decision-makers are the ones who have the capacity to reflect and observe, while the artists are overtaxed, overworked and without the resources to affect change.

And if these artists and changemakers were afforded the time and space to rest and restore, how much more effective would they be in their communities?

“My mom, in particular, has always taught me that you should give without question, give without expectation of immediate return. When you do, she would say, the good you put out into the world will come back to you. This extended to all things, not just relationships with people, but especially exchanges made with the plant and animal worlds.

She knew about the concept of reciprocal relationships before she knew the word reciprocity. And she always led by example. I think that’s one of the best ways to teach. Not just through prose, but through action.”

– MENTEE AND EVENT PARTICIPANT

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“Thank you for this opportunity to create a project that will hopefully be an event that continues in the lives and thoughts of the women honored... and possibly become something we can do again. Rulan was a blessing to work with. She has wonderful energy and reliable work ethics. Again thank you and all who work with the Catalyst Initiative to create a better world.”

– ROXANNE SWENTZELL

“This is not just about the restoration of women leaders, but relates to the whole context of changemakers being over capacity. Which is why the project was important. It might seem light to some, the thought of women getting together for restoration, but I’m just seeing how huge it is. Many things that are classified under the ‘feminine’ are not considered to be the ‘hard’ work.”

– RULAN TANGEN

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The Catalyst Initiative is an action research initiative — a model for supporting, advancing, and learning from innovative artist and community partner collaborations in order to reveal new possibilities for artistic contributions to community problem-solving and growth.

CENTER FOR PERFORMANCE + CIVIC PRACTICE © 2016 T H E C P C P. O R G THE ANDREW W.

MELLON FOUNDATION

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