Not Your Daddy

alt shot from 50 ways to leave your body

Benjy Russell. 2008

New store up on my site! You can find archival prints available of this piece and a ton of other work in various sizes and prices.

www.benjyrussell.net/printsandposters

Blithe Spirit (1945) dir. David Lean

Anna Brown Ehlers (right) and her art, made using Chilkat weaving techniques. Ehlers is Tlingit, born and raised in Juneau

h/t twitter.com/womensart1

Chilkat weaving is the absolute pinnacle of fiber art, and Anna Brown Ehlers is *the* master weaver.

Japan has a system where skilled traditional craftspeople and performers are recognized as “Living National Treasures”. These are people who have mastered their art and ensure that traditional techniques are kept alive and passed on. The tangible objects they create are masterpieces of great value, but their intangible skills and knowledge are priceless. It is a great honor to be a Living National Treasure, and the Japanese government has a specific grant to subsidize these artists so that they can continue to create and enrich the culture of Japan.

Indigenous artists deserve this level of recognition and support. Anna Brown Ehlers and Jennie Thlunaut were both awarded heritage fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, but that is really insufficient recognition for the work they’ve done to preserve and revive and teach the art of Chilkat weaving. Not only the weaving technique, but also the art of formline design itself.

I have very strong emotions on this topic.

Gay Rodeo by Blake Little, 1988-1992

Black and white photography

Anita Ekberg, defending herself with a bow and arrow against the Paparazzi outside her home, after being followed by them all night, 1960

From Eye to Eye: Portraits of Lesbians, 1979

photos by JEB

happy PRIDE i’m here i’m queer and i believe the land should be given back to the proper indigenous stewards.

Non-Natives reblogging this are great and wonderful

Please remember that "land back" does not mean "indigenous people are mystical elves with innate epigenetic wisdom of land stewardship and they don't belong in big cities," nor does it mean "non-indigenous people can't be farmers." What it DOES mean is that "non-indigenous farmers should be paying the equivalent of property taxes to the native governments their land was stolen from." It means, "there's a great deal of indigenous scholarship on sustainable agricultural practices that farmers should be taking into account, because indigenous agriculture was more advanced than European agriculture at the time Europe invaded the Americas and western agriculture *still* hasn't caught up in terms of figuring out how to produce equivalently high crop yields without compromising the ecosystem." It means, "non-indigenous farmers should be in an intellectual discourse with indigenous agricultural scientists and indigenous peoples that still do traditional farming, figuring how to repair the damage western farming practices have done to the ecosystem."

It also means that indigenous peoples should regain the right to sustain themselves on the land according to the practices they want, and they should have free reign to perform their cultural practices and protect their holy sites, as opposed to the current model where if they try to honor their dead on public lands they get violently removed.

Erika Hock, Body Trouble, 2021, exhibition view, L21 Gallery, Mallorca

Sway on the waves of love

2013

Benjy Russell

A very gentle glove

From Hazing the Muse by Benjy Russell and Rya Kleinpeter