Joshua Tree National Park

This is part of Barker Dam in Joshua Tree National Park and the hike towards the rock. This is the Serrano Desert region Indian area.

A film crew painted over the art many years ago destroying it sadly. They are not supposed to be these bright colors. The undamaged art I had to climb up in there. I discouraged peopel from touching and stepping on any of the art. I needed my light reflector to get better shots with the extreme shadows. I wonder what this art really looked like once upon a time.

Tunnel with motifs overpainted.

Below is a sheep motif. Too bad it was painted over :(

The photo above shows where the Petroglyphs are untouched. It's a flat area you can't really see form the ground and is in shadow.

Double diamonds below, possibly a rattelsnake motif, very popular at these sites.

Little man, about 8 inches long, hence my ruler.

Archer motif. This possibly told a story.

Little Alien (?) dude. Hmmmm area 51 stuff going on here???

A snake motif

This little sun was inside the wall and was painted over.

Anzo- Borrego Desert, Blair Valley Boys site

Hiking to the site. It wasn't the easiest to find with all the huge boulders, but with the help of my guide book I saw the particular boulders we were looking for. The Kumeyaay people lived in this region of Blair Valley. The black ink used was though to represent a male in a puberty initiation site. The boys were given a set of challenges and then raced to a special rock to draw with the help of a shaman their spirit guide. This site was vandalized unfortunetly. Some idiot lit a fire in the enclave where the art was supposed to be. All that was left was a little loop. On this rock are lots of capsules, little round circles ground in. They are the oldest rock known and are found all over the world, but their purpose is unknown. Some think they are calendars, maps, a language or my theory- punishment for bad teenage boys- come on, think of the punishment dished out, grinding into a rock all day! Pantone color check up!

Above and below are mortars for grinding seeds and roots to make medicine, paints, and food. I found a nice shady seat where ancient americans once sat grinding for hours on end.

More capsules below. What purpose do you suppose they serve?

Anzo -Borrrego Desert Blair Valley Pictographs in red

Here is the meetup group at the entrance to the trial and the next shot is the scenery. The Native Americans in this area were called the Kumeyaay. It is believed this site was a puberty ritual one for girls due to the red paint. The red was a female color as black was for males. This site is between 200-1,000 years old. Females during puberty go through a series of steps to become women. One is believed to involve ingesting native tobacco, or jimsonweed, and with the aid of a Shaman and spirit guides painting the rock. Of course, this is all theory. A little girl at the site though the drawings were done by children because "drawing is fun"- I like the simplicity of this.

The Diamond entopic zig zag motif to the right of my head is though to represent a rattle snake, an important spirit helper in Native American culture. the rock on the left on the ground has a mortar in it, a pleasant surprise, but it makes sense, perhaps it was used to grind pigment.

I use the Pantone system to see how accuate my pictures develop and for my art linocuts.

I love this little sun! How cool is that?

There is a faint yellow outline on some of the pictoglyphs, I wonder what it originally might have looked like.

Santa Margarita River Trail Hike

This is a trail in Fallbrook CA. It has lovely streams and a fabulous hike that lead to these Native American Findings by the Temecula band of Luiseno Mission Indians.

These footprint-sized bowl depressions, called morteros, carved by native tribes to grind grain.

After seeing these I knew rock art couldn't be too far away. Grinding stones meant a village was once there. I was winding along the trail when this large split rock caught my eye. Rock art is often painted on a split of a boulder because it was belived it was a path to the spirit world. After running and calling my hiking club to check it out, several expereinced rock art admirers sadly told me this is recent art. Wahhhh! I thougt it was cool, so I included it here. The picture of me is for scale. I'm 5'10"

Check out the lizard in the crack!

Hospital Rock Pictograph at Sequoia National Park

These are pictographs from Hospital Rock in Sequoia National Park, Califonia. It is east to get to from the main road and only a stone stair step up to this magnificent panel! You can see the zig zag and rattlesnake motifs, though to be a spirit helper. By the way, that's a really bad picture of me but I though it was cute I'm holding my favorite rock art book.

Petroglyph lampshade!

I saw this at a store in the Atlanta, Georgia Airport. I thought it was very cool but the store maanger had no idea where to get one! You could make one with a plain exacto blade and a dark, smooth lampshade.

Pictoglyph Art Project

This is an art project I did of pictoglyphs. I used linoleum and with the reduction method carved out 5 layers. I liked how it came out.