Lee Marmon, José Teofilo (Laguna)
Lee Marmon
1925-2021
Laguna Pueblo
Date
1961
Medium Specific
Photograph
Classification
Photograph
Dimensions
14 x 11 in. (35.6 x 27.9 cm)
Accession Number
2008.20.10.79
Credit
Gift of the Artist
Memo / Artist Statement
Jose Teofilo (1875-1963) was born and raised in Laguna Pueblo and was a farmer for most of his life. He was regarded as an excellent hunter and was still hunting deer when he was in his mid-eighties.
One of Jose's earliest memories was the railroad coming to Laguna in the 1880s when he was five years old. He and a friend were lying on the top of a mesa watching the first train go by, when suddenly the engine blew its whistle. The foreign sound frightened the children enough to make them run all the way home.
Jose Teofilo was eighty-five years when I took this photograph. He was very active, and while I was taking his picture, his granddaughters came out and said he had just come back from deer hunting. He went out with a group, and while they had gone, he stayed back at camp. A deer came back through camp and he killed it. (Marmon, Laguna Pueblo: A Photographic History, p.106)
One of Jose's earliest memories was the railroad coming to Laguna in the 1880s when he was five years old. He and a friend were lying on the top of a mesa watching the first train go by, when suddenly the engine blew its whistle. The foreign sound frightened the children enough to make them run all the way home.
Jose Teofilo was eighty-five years when I took this photograph. He was very active, and while I was taking his picture, his granddaughters came out and said he had just come back from deer hunting. He went out with a group, and while they had gone, he stayed back at camp. A deer came back through camp and he killed it. (Marmon, Laguna Pueblo: A Photographic History, p.106)
Biography
One of America’s most renowned Native American photographers, Marmon began his career in 1947, photographing elders and members of his community in Laguna Pueblo, New Mexico. Over the past fifty years Marmon’s work has been exhibited nationally and internationally. His diverse portfolio includes work with Columbia Pictures, official photographer for the Bob Hope Desert Classic for eight years, a Commission for the White House in 1972, and most recently photographing for the American Indian College Fund. The portfolio features photographic prints from throughout his career.