The spice of life is variety, and to that end I love things that celebrate our different cultures. My complexion is so pale even pale makeup is too dark. I never grew up labeled as a Native American, but I am descended of so-many-time great grandmothers from both my maternal and paternal lines that survived the Cherokee (Tsalagi) Trail of Tears. While Western Expansion greatly undermined the traditional cultures and way of life, whenever we have remnants, it’s a special thing. Each drumbeat, each dancer, the colorful outfits full of painstaking labor and artisan craftsmanship is a celebration of the ancestors that came before, and acts as a reminder of that echoing origin.

I enjoy going to these gatherings and each one provides an opportunity for me to continue to work on my photography skills as I challenge myself to capture the motion of dance, work on finding compositions that work at crowded events, and attempt to ever refine my candid photography.

Here’s some of my best shots I’ve taken in the last 3 years…

This grouping of images below was taken September 20, 2014 at Trader’s Village Powwow hosted in Grand Prairie, Texas.

 

This grouping of images below was taken June 8, 2015 at the University of Texas at Arlington’s Annual Charity Powwow hosted by NASA (Native American Student Association) on the UTA campus in Arlington, Texas. I was playing around with my shutter speed, and kind of liked the blurred effect of the one picture in pastels.

 

This grouping of images below was taken September 24, 2016 at the Trader’s Village Powwow hosted in Grand Prairie, Texas.