Yet to climb this same swing reveals the profound thoughts of different Native tribes: It is a commentary of the ugly past of American and Native conflict, and represents the history of abuse, quarantine and disrespect that our government has imposed on the Native Americans, and all that they honored and inhabited. It is this disconnect that I seek to explore in Altered State.Īn explosion of this eagle motif envelops the structure of this Capitol dome, and the swings inside suggest on one level a monstrously large, human size metal cage for this symbolic bird. But tellingly, in the American governments representation, the eagle is represented as more of a raptor bird, a symbol of pride, hegemony and global reach, than a symbol of spiritual reach. The animal speaks to the concept of freedom in both Native and colonial cultures. The down of eagle feathers is often sprinkled on guests during their ceremonies as a symbol of peace. In Native cultures, this majestic bird is a connection to the spirit world and the flight to the higher self. The symbol that I adopted as my theme was the Eagle. The inspiration for Altered State began as I reflected upon the theme of American Dream and asked the question who’s American? Whose dream? I thought of the Native Peoples of this country and sought to find a common symbolic and visual language that bonded them to American cultural symbols of today. On an alternate level, it draws on the American’s use of heavy, imposing classical Greek architecture and radically transforms it into a First Nations temple of light and mythologically inspired lace. On one level, it suggests the imposition of one power structure onto another. Who possesses it and at whose expense is it extracted? Is power ultimately an illusion? How could its fundamental values evolve? Altered State is a physical reflection of a union of these ideas in architectural form. With American Dream, we craft the collective consciousness in physical form.Īltered State is a commentary on the nature of power and it’s transformation.
At Burning Man, as in Native American culture, Art and its creation is intimately connected to ceremony, spirituality, and myth, within social and political systems. Yet the timing speaks to the necessity of our community’s collective participation in our own culture: in reflecting it, questioning it, condemning it, exalting it and being present at this country’s moment in history, balanced between the mistakes of the past and the possibility of the future. There have been so many varied reactions and responses. Once again this year’s theme of the American Dream at Burning Man could not have been more culturally significant. This monolithic government building is altered in a union of opposite ideas: the symbolic cage transforms into a carved temple of wisdom and transcendence. This mythic structure is at its core a gathering space to ruminate on the origin of American “civilization” amidst the enduring power, dignity and vision of its Native Peoples. As one climbs upward, every platform reveals the wisdom of a different Indian Nation carved into the seats. To that purpose, you ascend the swings into a vaulted dome of hundreds of carved eagle feathers.
Yet the repeated symbol of the Eagle is the uniting symbol of both cultures and, for First Nations peoples, it is a creature that represents insight, the spirit world, and the quest for the higher self. Together these elements create what seems to suggest the set of an elaborate birdcage, placed ironically and symbolically within the framework of a colonialist political power symbol. The interior light-filled space vaults three stories overhead and a ladder of carved white swings descends from above. Every inch of this iconoclastic structure tells a story of the illusion of power and the power of illusion.Įntering inside one of the 20 eagle doorways is like stepping into a cage of white lace. Everywhere your eye rests is rendered in the archetypal graphic style of Pacific Northwest Coast Indian imagery.
You discover this symbol of the United States has been fabricated of elaborately carved white steel, its entire surface inhabited by faces, feathers, hands, eyes, eagles, monsters and humans morphing into birds. Upon your approach, the monolithic structure’s solid walls dissolve, and mythical creatures evolve before your eyes. Yet there is an essential quality to its surface, and the classical heavy Greek architecture seems to vibrate with strange and unfamiliar shapes. Far off in the distance you observe with dismay a symbol of government rule on the Playa.