Recently I was introduced to Ledger Art. I had picked up a magazine in Sante Fe, The 2019 Indian Market Guide through the South Western Association of Indian Arts – SWAIA.

It is Native American Artwork on antique ledger paper, the creative stories and drawings of Native Americans. A story is told, that cuts through the lined borders and compartmental dividers of a calendar plan. A native musician-warrior plays upon a sheet of arranged notes, an illustrated story drawn upon a Caucasian composition.

I notice shared a thought, it seems like an artistic protest of the imposing form, documents and structure of foreign peoples. A sphere of perception is an agreed upon reality. A sphere of perception can be imposed upon an individual or group. It is strange but very true, to consider something like the western calendar as oppressive or unreal. An excepting system with a sphere of perception may be oppressive to another sphere of perception. The calendar, like the clock is not a Truth about reality, it is a formation of reference, an orientation system, a reality management tool but not reality itself.

The native flute needs no notation to play a song in the moment. Natures voice, a part of the wilderness, the natural environment. The composition on paper, like plans for a building, an intentional creation that may or may not withstand the flow of the universal river, the flow of natures process.

The most believed story is the largest sphere of perception. The story with the most objects and the most engagement is the most powerful. The most powerful does not mean the most truthful or the most real.

Modern humanities greatest pitfall, the belief that the most powerful sphere of perception is the most correct. If oppressed spheres of perception are more correct, then how to illuminate the issue and peacefully resist. How to expand the correctness of oppressed spheres of perception?

DJK 11.16.2020