Taos stands in solidarity with the multitude of movements spanning the country, like the Black Lives Matter movement, the LGBTQ movement and the Water Is Life movement. Taos does not want to succumb to the racial and cultural war that is brewing in the United States. Taos is our home, and we would like to set the example for the rest of our country.
Tempo, the arts and culture magazine of the Taos News, is producing a series on prejudice and reconciliation in our own community.
As tensions over racism flare across the United States, Taos News freelance reporter JuanIsidro Concha is exploring the complicated history of race, prejudice and social justice in Northern New Mexico. Concha is interviewing creatives and activists of different cultures, ages, backgrounds and political views, who have thought deeply about racism. He’s working with Taos News photographer and videographer Morgan Timms to document these conversations. The interviews will be posted as videos on the Taos News YouTube channel. With support from people like you, the Taos News also plans to make the videos available as a podcast and to extend the conversation by hosting a Zoom forum and eventually a town hall.
Few people in our community require no introduction. Among those is John Nichols, author of the New Mexico Trilogy, most notably “The Milagro Beanfield War” (1974), which focuses on the complex histories and ethnic diversity, along with the cultural harmony and chaos that exists, in his fictional version of Northern New Mexico. A fictional world not too unlike our own.
Tempo caught up with educator Larry Torres recently at his home in Arroyo Seco for the second installment of In the Valle: Prejudice and Reconciliation in Taos.
Tempo's third installment of In the Valle: Prejudice and Reconciliation in Taos features Taos Pueblo Tourism Director Ilona Spruce.
Anita Rodriguez is the embodiment of the ancestral Taoseña.
With her family ties to the Río Grande dating back some 300 years, Rodriguez joins our conversation for the fourth installment of In The Valle: Prejudice and Reconciliation in Taos. "I'm as Indigenous as you can get without being on the tribal rolls," she said.
For our fifth installment, Tempo talks with Bill Whaley, Horse Fly founder and editor.
Whaley, back in 1966, moved to Taos so he could ski. Enlisting with the New Mexico National Guard kept him in Taos, and what a life it's been for the valle's most notorious gringo.
Visual artist, educator and activist Nikesha Breeze joins our conversation this week on In the Valle: Prejudice and Reconciliation in Taos. Breeze works with various organizations throughout Northern New Mexico, mostly teaching and sustaining social justice and change. Breeze is also an art teacher for the Taos Academy.
Anne MacNaughton retired from University of New Mexico in 2012, yet her days of educating are far from over.
Joining Tempo for the eighth installment of In the Valle: Prejudice and Reconciliation in Taos is author and longtime resident Iris Keltz.
Norteño David Fernandez de Taos is a deeply spiritual person.
Of the Fernandez y Quintana families who first came to this valley nearly 600 years ago, Fernandez has participated, intimately, in every aspect of Taos - El Norte, as he refers to the area. Fernandez has been a part of Taos' arts, politics, spirituality, religion and culture throughout his life.
