Pixiq

The high desert light of Taos, New Mexico and Santa Fe have attracted an astonishing mix of interesting people to the spare, open spaces washed with color and wild skies at any season of the year.

All of the Four Corners states, Colorado, New Mexico, Utah and Arizona have long held fascination for everyone from artists/photographers to Kit Carson, elite ex-pats from the coasts to motorcycle touring groups from around the world.  We’re no different! In college and for many years thereafter, no summer went by without the obligatory trek south on I25 to the magical Land of Enchantment.

But we had never spent Christmas in Taos to see the famous Christmas Eve celebration at the Taos Pueblo.

I had heard much about this event, and always wanted to go. Need I say that indigenous events and festivals around the world are the things we love best to photograph?

Heading down the highway has always meant heading toward magic for me. I25 stretched mostly clear on a chill December morning until turning west, following hard blue skies and snow choked mountain pass of LaVeta, and the little southwestern Colorado towns that were early forts and outposts of civilization. After turning sharply south again through sparsely populated high inland plains, the New Mexico line is almost a visual geographic boundary. The terrain changes quickly and dramatically. Excitement mounts, because I know what is on the other end of the line!

Grey clouds presaging snow began to settle, a hushed and muffled blanket floating down closer and closer. You plump down on Taos without hardly seeing it approaching. Suddenly there’s a traffic light and buildings. I don’t think there’s any structure in town over three stories. It’s a local ordinance. Soft colored earthy adobe construction and Territorial style homes are the rule.

Once you arrive in northern New Mexico, you just feel different. Almost like being in another century.

I notice my language, while remembering, is getting old-fashioned too. We luckily found last minute lodging at La Fonda de Taos. One of the original inns that have been hosting weary travelers, merchants and explorers since the early 1800’s. Hooray, our room looked right out over the town plaza, and as we bundled in our mountain winter clothing and secret packages, a dusting of snow began to fall in the square. What romance peering through lace curtains at the festive scene! The victorian style bandstand and lighted lanterns glistening in the dusk, luminarias glowing on every roof and colored bulbs on the large evergreen that dominates year round.

First thing we went out in the snow, celebrating in the crisp air and purple light. What did you expect? All kinds of pictures! My present to Karl was a Canon G12, so we had to learn how to use it rather than our standard 5D Mark IIs! What better than putting the camera through its paces in low light, preparing for Christmas Eve at the Taos Pueblo.

Certainly there was a good deal of eating involved, and next day, Christmas Eve Day, was full of bright sun, shopping, de rigeur breakfast at Michael’s Kitchen and more pictures in the picturesque town. We knew to arrive at the pueblo early about 4PM, because huge crowds are always expected. Literally several thousand people within the pueblo precincts and tiny church. The entry road is parked full for several miles, and late comers must walk far in the dark and the cold.

Did I say cold? Burr! 

Native American artisan shops and hospitality were already open doors, but the main traditional dances don’t start until church vespers are over and the procession of the saints winds around the central plaza between the multi-storied “apartment house” structures that make the Taos Pueblo famous and unique in architecture. It’s a not to be missed sight at any season, and dates back more than 1,000 years.

Seeking shelter from the high altitude cold, we wedged into the back rows of the tiny church, standing so close to other visitors that almost no movement was possible. Claustrophobia finally getting the better of us, we braved the chill again, and in the plaza 10 great bonfires of fragrant pinon wood were being lit. Close to 15 feet high, the cross piled logs redolent with highly combustible sap caught fire quickly, flaming high and hot, turning back the clock into a scene from colonial times. The sound of the flames remains in memory as loud with fearsome crackle and roaring air as it was then.

Careful not to photograph people's faces, dancers or religious ceremony, we could not resist a secretive photograph of the extraordinary festival scene of visitors waiting for the dancing to begin. Please note that photographs of the events and participants are forbidden by the Taos Pueblo Governing body and residents, but entrance to view the dances and ceremonies is free to the public. The processions and dances are an astounding combination of Native American, Hispanic Catholic and Colonial traditions.  At one point elders with antique rifles fire into the air to scare away evil spirits from the passage of the saintly statue born on a litter and preceded in dance by very young children. From the eagle-eye heights of the pueblo not open to the public, many residents and families wrapped themselves in blankets to watch the proceedings. Across the central stream and around by the south pueblo danced the procession, lit always by the giant bonfires. 

In postproduction I discovered that the intense heat from the fires created rising air currents which caused our one special image to have less than the sharpness I had hoped. Going pixel by pixel I drew in a sharper outline of the territorial church with its double towers and cross, as well as detail in the logs of the bonfires. In the manner of the famous artists who have enjoyed the inspiration of the multi-cultural, multi-hued land of Northern New Mexico, I decided to interpret the image like a watercolor. I added deeper shadows, just a little saturation, because colors recorded very close to what the eye saw, and a brush-stroke feel to the crowds of onlookers.

Here's an interpretation Karl made from an image with ok content, but mundane in full color. Antique presentation brings past centuries alive again. Looks like an image right out of an Edward Curtis portfolio.

A fabulous experience in culture and melding of peoples, if you ever have the opportunity to visit out in the wilds of the Southwest at the Christmas season, this is a place and event to put on your short list.

Further reading about Taos and the artists and photographers who lived there.

About the on-going Taos school of art and the Taos Society of Artists.

The Taos School was an art colony founded in Taos, New Mexico by artists attracted by the rich culture of the Taos Pueblo and beautiful landscape. Artisans in Spanish Colonial styles as well as furniture, tin work, Native American traditional crafts such as drums, pottery, silver and beads created a rich, multicultural heritage in this historic area.

In the last years of the 19th century, Bert Geer Phillips and Ernest L. Blumenschein are credited with the earliest founding of the art colony. Heiress Mabel Dodge Luhan and her Native American husband Tony established an influential circle, attracting generations of artists, many from Europe, to this northern New Mexico town. It is said by some she greatly annoyed all time favorite painter Georgia O’Keeffe.

Among the most famous names are writer D.H. Lawrence, oil painter Nicolai Fechin and photographers Ansel Adams, Edward Curtis, Laura Gilpin and Paul Strand. Later artists include Clyfford Still (a museum exclusive to his work just opened in Denver, Colorado), Mark Rothko, Leon Gaspard, Richard Diebenhorn, Louis Ribak, R. C. Gorman - and always remembering the many Native Americans of the area who remain dedicated to the arts over generations and centuries.