Eco Tourism

Tourism

Laurie Simmons worked at one point in her career as a photographer for a dollhouse miniature company.[1] Then in 1984 after a trip to Greece and the Acropolis, she started photographing doll size “Teenettes” in front of blown up “bad” slides of traditional tourist attractions such as Stonehenge and the Great Wall of China. She used slides collected from tourist shops and from museum collections.[2] She made these images on 60 by 40 inch Cibachromes often greatly altering the color. At the heart of her images is the concept that one often better experiences those “must see” sites in ways other than just going there. I sort of remember thinking when traveling and viewing, say the Great Pyramid of Giza, that I had some sort of moral obligation to just love being there even though it was beastly hot, smelly and I was tired. In Simmons Tourism [3] that site is never hot, smelly and you need not be tired. I used this series as a starting point for my Eco Tourism series.

Eco Tourism

Unlike Simmons, I have never really been interested in dolls even though as a child I was encouraged to collect them. What I did long for as a child was miniature china animals. One girl in my school would give these out for birthday presents. Even though I never got any figurines from her I did get a set of deer from friend. Maybe that longing and my love of animals is why I was drawn to the plastic animal miniatures online and picked them for this project.

I’m very distressed by the whole global warming dilemma and don’t really see a solution. I think in time it will evolve into a situation with the rich in walled “castles” on the hill and every one else battling it out for limited resources in the streets below. The real losers will all the other species and the earth itself. As it stands, we are now in the midst of a mass extinction with 30 to 50 percent of all species going extinct. The cause of that extinction is us humans. For shocking reading see this website: National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.

I picked for my “tourists” in my Eco [specie] Tourism series a little collection of plastic animals. They may in the real world be one of the losing (going extinct) species. The choice of these animals was pretty arbitrary, basically depending on price and which figures I could get delivered and receive while on the road. I started out with fox, wolf and bear and then I also purchased coyote, hawk and owl at a nature sanctuary. I photographed them in a variety of locations, locations we humans visit but are not living, and where these animals might be questioning our humanity and the lessons we humans could learn from that location.

As to the images, in post production I did alter the colors, some slightly and some more than slightly, using Nik software filters in Photoshop. The header image and the Gettysburg image are both National Archive historic photographs of Gettysburg battle sites and the animals were added using Photoshop.

Fort Stanton Cemetery

The first site my little tourists visited was the military cemetery at Fort Stanton in New Mexico. Fort Stanton is a very odd fort. It looks like it belongs anywhere but in the mountains of New Mexico. Built during the Civil War, it did service in both World War I and II. Mostly it was a hospital but it also saw duty as an internment camp for German Merchant Marines, three of whom died while detained there. Near the fort is a cemetery where US Merchant Marines and veterans of the other services are buried.[5] What would these our small travelers of the animal kingdom think of our whole “war” thing?

Chaco Canyon

The next tourist site is Chaco Canyon. Magnificent, as it is major architectural accomplishment containing a five story complex, perhaps the largest dwelling until that of New York in 1882.[6]

The structures here were built between 900 and 1100 AD making Chaco pretty remarkable. Odd this ruin however. This is a place of mysteries. We really don’t know the whys of this place. Why here? Did they live here? The current theory is no, only about a 100 individuals lived here year round. There are few bones and little trash. Yet is a very very large ruin site. Objects and feathers (along with the bones of the birds) originating in Mexico have found in the rooms so this was a center of trade. Many now believe that this was a place of ceremony. There are many kivas (currently in Pueblo culture a kiva is a religious ceremonial site) and many of the buildings and windows are oriented to astrological observations. Then, in about 1100 AD Chaco was abandoned. No one now knows for sure why. Reasons given are severe draught and non sustainable land usage and political and religious disagreement leading to warfare and even cannibalism. When the people left here they then built and lived in those high cliff houses with long rope ladders. Not exactly child friendly dwellings. Think of having to carry water and groceries home! Good however for dropping rocks or burning branches down on your enemies. These dwellings would be safe “castles on the hill” in a time of upheaval.

According to a Hopi elder I once heard, the Hopi finally came to their current mesas, located were living is difficult, so they would always be reminded to live an ethical life. For, as he said, when you have a lot, you can get greedy and forget how to get along, but when you have little, you always are reminded. And, the Hopi say they are descended from those who built Chaco.

Three Rivers

Three Rivers is the site of a large collection of ancient rock art carvings that are easy to see and visit. There are more than 21,000 glyphs of birds, animals and humans. One can see faces that conform to the rocks. The petroglyphs here date back to between 900 and 1400 AD and were created by the Jornada Mogollon people. [7]

I have long been interested in early American rock art. We have such a rich culture but it often goes the way of the bulldozer or is used for target practice. People who go to Europe to look at cave art, never realize or fight to preserve what we have in this country. Like the animals we are killing off, we are destroying this part of our culture.

Gettysburg, dead horses with Eco Tourist, wolf, fox and bear — Gettysburg

Sources:

[1] Laurie Simmons, Collection Online, Guggenheim, https://www.guggenheim.org/artwork/artist/laurie-simmons

[2]Laurie Simmons, Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laurie_Simmons

Tourism

Eco Tourism

Fort Stanton Cemetery

Chaco Canyon

Three Rivers

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