Lodge of Many Moons.                                    

Totem of Taboo.                                    

Icon of Urban Indian Youth.

Lodge of Many Moons, 1997 (front view).
36" x 32" x 32".

The first work contains the painting from the Louvre and concerns the mother's role in racial and cultural assimilation. This is the Lodge of Many Moons. It measures about four feet by four feet by five feet. The inspiration for the construction derives from the native American moon lodge. This was loosely the feminine equivalent of the sweat lodge. The painting which is backed with red suede hangs in the middle of a construction made from trees. There is a warrior stick which is topped by two decorated eggs. Women are warriors too. They just are not the combat variety. There are artifacts from the Mississippi River bottom as well as feathers, beads, fur, and a medicine bundle. The tops of each tree column carry gold leafed birds facing the four cardinal directions. On the ground surrounding the installation is a circle of cornmeal to symbolize nurturance and the continuity of life.

- Martha Hollingsworth, 1998

Our mothers tuned their body rhythms to the changing moon. At the midnight hour, the moon danced announcing a new day arriving. Days and nights came. Days and nights went. The cycles of time and life water held the promise of tomorrow's ancestors. In the Moonlodge, our mothers, the progenitors of nations, practiced their sacred powers to make, to create, to transform.

They birthed the sons and daughters of alien races. They pushed the confines of the cardinal directions to draw the circle of life which held all their children of north, south, east, or west in mother love.

Lodge of Many Moons, 1997 (rear view).
36" x 32" x 32".

Copy of Madame Rousseau et sa fille by Louise Vigee-Le Brun.
(Detail from Lodge of Many Moons, 1997)

Totem of Taboo, 1997 (front view).
54" x 26" x 31".

The second installation concerns the father's role in bicultural transition. The original painting, which was done in the 18th century by the French painter Fragonard, hangs in the Art Institute of Chicago. My copy was executed in the galleries of the Art Institute of Chicago. I took this copy off the stretcher and placed it onto a half cylinder to create the effect of a ceremonial mask. I placed this on a tripod structure. The back of the portrait is covered with suede and bark. There are gold leafed, sculpted antlers on the floor underneath. On top of the entire structure are true antlers. The entire piece is ornamented with beads, fur, feathers and other idiosyncratic native American artifacts. It is approximately six feet tall and three feet wide. It has an accompanying poem. The feel is very totemic.

- Martha Hollingsworth, 1998

Bobcat and Forkedtongue sat side by side on the family tree. Kounta Kinte came by too. They fathered the children of the invisible race, keepers of the Covenant Of Hushed Truth.

The Covenant sanctioned citizenship of the Arithmetic Nation. One half, quadroon, octoroon.....Short division and subtraction are how the government counts. Federal tribal numbers defy the exponential nature of the generations.

In the beauty of the Oklalilies pureblood was born. Only Indians who don't come in parts wanted.

Totem of Taboo, 1997 (rear view).
54" x 26" x 31".

Copy of Portrait d'un Homme by Jean Honore Fragonard.
(Detail from Totem of Taboo, 1997)

Icon of Urban Indian Youth, 1997.
54" x 36" x 6".
Collection of the artist.

The third work in this series is not free standing. It measures about five feet in height and three feet in width. The tree construction was built to represent the papoose. There is a portrait of Geoff, my son. (This isn't a museum copy, although I think he is handsome enough to be in the Louvre.) Onto the portrait I integrated a small triptych which Geoff himself had made. It is a poignant witness to the drug culture and multi culturalism given that it is written in French. Many people do not know that native American youth have the highest suicide, drug abuse, and alcoholism rates of the entire nation. Above the portrait is a sculpture of an angel in drag which Geoff sculpted. This speaks of the loss of innocence. There is a collage inserted above the portrait. It is made of magazine cutouts of tattoos. There is a cultural relationship between today's tattoo craze and tribal rites of passage.

- Martha Hollingsworth, 1998

My child of today, you were born before the wake of time. You are the immortality of broken promises. Your golden hair catches dancing sunlight as you walk the smoldering earth of the forgotten ancestors. Dark blue spots on your pink baby bottom betrayed your rank in the despised breed. You are the breathing confusion of three maimed worlds. Take your medicine bundle upon your cross. Scoff the trickster evil. Spirit Ancestor and Emmanuel protect you. Look back as you look forward. You cannot run away from who you are.