The Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian brings the best of traditional knowledge and traditions to visitors during its seventh annual Living Earth Festival Friday, July 15, through Sunday, July 17. This year’s festival focuses on traditional agricultural practices and the importance of Native foods and includes a screening of two Seasoned with Spirit episodes, a Native chef cooking symposium, musical performances and artist demonstrations. The full schedule is available on the museum’s website.
Traditional songs and powwow-style dances will be presented by Tinkus Llajtaymanta, Tradiciones Bolivanas and Grupo Etina who will perform daily at 1 p.m. and 4 p.m. in the Potomac Atrium. During “Music and Dance Along the Inka Road,” the groups will perform traditional dances of Bolivia and the Andes accompanied by traditional instruments.
In the museum’s Rasmuson Theater, two episodes of the Emmy Award-winning PBS series Seasoned with Spirit, “Return of the Buffalo—Lakota” and “Cuisine of the Desert Southwest—Tohono Oo’dham,” will be showcased Saturday afternoon.
On Friday at 2 p.m., the festival will feature the symposium “Chefs’ Conversation: Celebrating Healthy Native Foods” in the Rasmuson Theater. Chefs Loretta Barrett Oden (Citizen Band Potawatomi), Velvet Button (Tohono O’odham), Felicia Cocotzin Ruiz (Xicana/Tiwa) and Terri Ami (Hopi/Navajo) will discuss sustainable farming practices, food sovereignty and the decolonization food movement. Oden, host of Seasoned with Spirit, will moderate.
After the symposium, there will be wine tasting with the Cedar Band of Paiutes in the Mitsitam Coffee Bar.
Throughout the festival, daily food demonstrations will be conducted by mother–daughter team Ramona and Velvet Button, featuring heirloom foods grown on Ramona Farms, located on the Gila River Indian Reservation in Sacaton, Ariz. Chefs will incorporate this year’s featured food, potatoes, in their dishes. Recipes will be available to visitors.
Bead workers, basket makers, sculptors, weavers, potters and carvers will demonstrate their art in the Potomac Atrium. This year’s artists include Porfirio Gutierrez (Oaxacan), a traditional weaver that uses all-natural plants and insect dyes; Elizabeth James-Perry (Aquinnah Wampanoag), an artist that creates naturally dyed milkweed weavings and wampum jewelry from the quahog shell; Jesus Garcia, a cultural interpreter at the Arizona Sonora Desert Museum who will demonstrate the art and science of weaving horsehair and agave rope; and Joey Lopez (Tohono O’odham) will demonstrate basket weaving using unique materials.
Shelden Nuñez-Velarde (Jicarilla Apache) will demonstrate making micaceous pottery and basket weaving and Wilma and Dena Skenandore (Potawatomi/Oneida) will demonstrate the healing qualities of their essential oils, creams and salves.
For more details about the festival, visit AmericanIndian.si.edu. Follow the museum via social media on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram and use the hashtag #LivingEarth.
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SI-327-2016
Lisa Austin
212-514-3826
