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  • The new construction of the Acoma Pueblo Visitors and Cultural Center (foreground) is watched over by the ancient community of Sky City perched on the mesa top behind. This image symbolizes the Acoma community's respect for its ancestors, history, and traditions and its commitment to perpetuate its unique and sacred way of life into the future.
    old and new 0017.jpg
  • A grainite monument shaped as an arrowhead and placed at the Sky City Cultural Center displays the official seal of Acoma Pueblo.  The ring of 11 nature symbols surrounding the center designate the surviving Acoma clans.  The two crossed canes festooned with red and blue ribbons signify the gifts given by the Spanish and American governments recognizing Acoma ownership of Pueblo land and the sovereignty of the Pueblo people.
    seal 0999.jpg
  • Details of adobe pueblo construction show how wood-framed windows are set into the stone-and-plastered walls of the houses atop the mesa on which Acoma Pueblo people built their Sky City hundreds of years ago.  Some Acoma families still occupy such houses year round while others use their Sky City homes only during feast days and other celebrations and ceremonies.
    windows 0957.jpg
  • Adobe ovens like this one have long been used for baking round loaves of ovenbread, and similar structures are used for firing Acoma's famous pottery. The family that uses this oven has a great view of the inspiring landscape surrounding Sky City.
    adobe oven 0978.jpg
  • Acoma history tells that when the people first discovered this valley, they believed the Creator wanted them to inhabit Enchanted Mesa.  Eventually, they discovered their mistake and relocated their community to Sky City mesa: a much better vantage point for admiring the beauty the Creator bestowed on Enchanted Mesa and its surrounding landscape!
    enchanted vista 0981.jpg
  • Acoma people built multi-story houses that included a sacred space, or kiva, on the ground floor. When Spanish conquerors attempted to eradicate Puebloan religious beliefs and practices, kivas were hidden behind high walls or transformed into windowless rooms accessible only by ladder.  Straight pine logs used to build ladders had to be hauled from the forested slopes of Mt. Taylor, many miles away.  This ladder's worn rungs, along with a family's firewood piled nearby, testify to its continued use.
    ladder 0964.jpg
  • Vegetation is sparse at the top of Sky City's arid mesa.  Plants need water, and, historically, water for a family's use was hand-carried up the cliff.  Agriculture was only developed in the valley below.  This cottonwood tree, its winter-barren branches awaiting spring's arrival, has been nurtured for decades to provide beauty and shade for its human brothers and sisters.
    moon over pueblo.jpg
  • Massive boulders and vertical cliff walls helped protect ancient Sky City from Spanish destruction.  The price in daily life activities was high: every building stone, ladder or fire log, and gallon of water people used had to be carried by hand up to the mesa top.
    sky city 0012.jpg
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CWP: Transforming Nature into Digital Art, by Jennifer Nelson

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