Michael Markham

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Michael Markham





Michael Markham





Michael Markham






CAMPFIRE STORIES and VISITATIONS — Red Cloud's Ghost

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This project consists of a photograph of Red Cloud, the Oglala leader, projected onto the smoke of a campfire. As the smoke moves about in the breezes Red Cloud's image appears and disappears — the thicker the smoke the more vivid the image.

The campfire is something that is created out in the landscape. At night the campfire becomes the center of the world — it's where the light and the warmth is — and the world beyond the light cast by the fire is dark and often dangerous.

Since it's origins the campfire must have been a place for community and the campfire and story-telling must have always gone hand-in-hand. No doubt, in very ancient times, campfire gatherings must have been a time for hunters and warriors to tell of their exploits. Today many campfire stories are ghost stories and, while many are light-hearted fictions (often told to give children a fright) there are truly ghosts on the landscape — of people who have passed before us and whose spritits still engage us and speak to us. The landscape is saturated with their stories — some heroic, some not so — that speak to the human drama. These stories tell us about how we behave and how we adapt and how we survive (or not). Many stories tell of failure and tragedy. If we want to know the landscape we need to know these stories — many which go well back in time.






Michael Markham





Michael Markham





Michael Markham





Michael Markham





Michael Markham





Michael Markham





Michael Markham





Michael Markham





Michael Markham





Michael Markham





Michael Markham





Michael Markham





NATURE MORTE

Assembled by Michael Markham


Michael Markham

Above: Headline Haiku



Michael Markham