Haudenosaunee: Portraits of the Firekeepers, the Onondaga Nation

Toba Pato Tucker, who has photographed the Navajo and Zuni Indians of the Southwest, the Shinnecock and Montauk Indians on eastern Long Island and the Pueblo people of New Mexico and Arizona, now creates a record of the Onondaga, the Native people who have inhabited the hills of central New York for fifteen thousand years.Using a simple black backdrop and available daylight, her portraits show the timeless, contemplative images that reify the spirit that has maintained the Onondaga for centuries. Of her work Tucker has said, "Native Americans are an ancient people striving to retain their traditional way of life and integrity while confronting modern society and the dominant culture. I want to record them, for history and for art, at the end of the twentieth century."