Coyote Tales, No. 1

In Coyote Tales No. 1, Cara Romero creates a constructed image in front of the iconic Saints and Sinners bar in Española, New Mexico. The photograph has three figures present: Derek No-Sun Brown, Kaa Folwell and Dina DeVore. Brown is pictured as Coyote, a figure often described as a trickster in many Indigenous communities, while DeVore and Folwell directly confront the viewer by staring out through the camera. Romero amplifies natural elements pictured, including the addition of stars and red lighting to create a metaphysical aspect to the photograph, one that echoes notions of the supernatural. The work highlights a hybridity between this notion of “traditional” and “contemporary” Indigenous existence and experience, rejecting a colonial binary and centering a continuum of culture.