David Sucec instructing students at the Uintah River High School in Fort Duchesne.
Utah is internationally renowned for its national parks and their singular landscapes. Much less recognized are the state’s remarkable pictographs and petroglyphs, which convey the art of its pre-historic and historic native communities. Reaching back 8,000 years before the present, these remarkable images provide direct access to the sensibilities and histories of Utah’s first peoples and are among our nation’s oldest and most precious cultural artifacts.
Sacred Images: A Vision of Native American Rock Art brings together the visions of Utah wilderness photographers Craig Law, John Telford, and Tom Till; the insights of Utah artist and art historian David Sucec; and the storytelling skills of CDEA executive director Leslie Kelen who worked with Hopi, Paiute, Northern Ute, White Mesa Ute, and Northwest Shoshone people to convey the meaning and significance of Utah’s rock art.
The exhibit contains forty-five color photographs and extensive wall text and is accompanied by a 112-page catalogue, available through the Canyonlands Natural History Association; a curriculum guide for grades 1-4 and 9-12, accessible on the UEN website at http://www.uen.org/sacredimages/; and a thirty-minute film, produced by CDEA, that features four easy lessons for Utah art teachers wishing to use these images to inspire contemporary student art work.
Sacred Images—Artists-in-Residence Program
Mural in progress at Jordan High School in Sandy.
The Sacred Images—Artists-in Residence program offers intermediate, high school, and college-age students a unique opportunity to expand and enrich their educational experiences.
A month-long, four-part program, this residency is geared to introduce students to the remarkable pictographs and petroglyphs that function, in the words of Pulitzer Prize winning author N. Scott Momaday, as “the beginning of art in America and the origin of American Literature.”
CDEA’s program includes the following activities:
- Placement of the award-winning Sacred Images exhibit at a participating school and description of Utah’s four major Utah rock art styles, provided by David Sucec, rock art historian;
- Field trip to a local rock art site guided by David Sucec, rock art historian;
- Master classes on storytelling and discussions of Native American oral tradition led by Dovie Thomason, a nationally recognized Native American storyteller; and
- Mural painting with Lee Madrid or Ruby Chacón, Utah artists, who help participating students translate their project and personal experiences onto a mural-sized canvas.
The Sacred Images—Artists-in Residence program is a unique educational opportunity that ignites students’ imaginations; inspires connections between the far past and the present; connects history, storytelling, and visual art; and helps students bridge cultural differences.