Josteen Yazzi said the Critic should ask his thought
on the matter of great art and literature
What do you know of art and literature, Uncle?
Nothing, he said, I think about what I do not know.
I do not know why people don't like Norman Rockwell.
Norman Rockwell painted the American Dream,
with Indians in it, some times.
I like Norman Rockwell because I know how he felt.
I saw my people live in a good world that vanished.
Magic or other wise, I remember mine,
the way
when I see
Mr. Rockwell's America as he imagined
he had seen it.
Or maybe he painted
what you should have been able to see,
but for wars and Spanish Flu and cattle barons
and reaping machines and steam and electricity.
Olaf Wieghorst coulda painted America ugly, too.
But he didn't.
Literature. I have nothing left to say, Norman Rockwell, maybe he needed a mentioning for some
reader anchored reason.
We have to deal with that more these days.
People with big old dish antennae out there,
rusting after Direct TV got a satellite to see the res,
Some o'the kids build a radio telescope, outa them three meter models,
so we are connected.
Norman Rockwell painted the Peaceful Kingdom,
just like Mr. Hicks and Mr. Kincaid,
not mr klee or mr picaso, they could image hell.
My ma liked That drippy guy, said she could see the swing of things in he's paintings, What's-isname,
Jackson, damshame, Jackson Pollak right?
but the message is in the medium, that's what my Shicheii yoosto say. Art must sing.
So I can play my drum. And she can dance.
When we think nothing about it.
Nov 6, 2018
Nov 6, 2018 at 8:45 PM UTC
Josteen Yazzi said the Critic should ask his thought
on the matter of great art and literature
What do you know of art and literature, Uncle?
Nothing, he said, I think about what I do not know.
I do not know why people don't like Norman Rockwell.
Norman Rockwell painted the American Dream,
with Indians in it, some times.
I like Norman Rockwell because I know how he felt.
I saw my people live in a good world that vanished.
Magic or other wise, I remember mine,
the way
when I see
Mr. Rockwell's America as he imagined
he had seen it.
Or maybe he painted
what you should have been able to see,
but for wars and Spanish Flu and cattle barons
and reaping machines and steam and electricity.
Olaf Wieghorst coulda painted America ugly, too.
But he didn't.
Literature. I have nothing left to say, Norman Rockwell, maybe he needed a mentioning for some
reader anchored reason.
We have to deal with that more these days.
People with big old dish antennae out there,
rusting after Direct TV got a satellite to see the res,
Some o'the kids build a radio telescope, outa them three meter models,
so we are connected.
Norman Rockwell painted the Peaceful Kingdom,
just like Mr. Hicks and Mr. Kincaid,
not mr klee or mr picaso, they could image hell.
My ma liked That drippy guy, said she could see the swing of things in he's paintings, What's-isname,
Jackson, damshame, Jackson Pollak right?
but the message is in the medium, that's what my Shicheii yoosto say. Art must sing.
So I can play my drum. And she can dance.
When we think nothing about it.
Thinking about America and an old man who taught me to ball trees. I had a job rescuing orange trees, Josteen Yazzi, he's not really a Navajo, but he was a bracero who staid without papers and nobody cared cause he was the last tree baller.
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