加州奥克兰博物馆宣布推出新展览，探讨原住民的用火习俗与加州的生态未来
Oakland, CA — 9月 4, 2025 — The Oakland Museum of California (OMCA) announces Good Fire: Tending Native Lands, a new special exhibition exploring how Native communities in Northern California have long used controlled fire—also called “good fire” or “cultural burning”—to care for the land and uphold traditions. The exhibition is organized in collaboration with Native fire practitioners, artists, ecologists, and cultural leaders based in Northern California (full list below).
At a time when catastrophic wildfires dominate headlines, Good Fire: Tending Native Lands reframes the narrative: fire is not solely a force of destruction, but also a vital tool for maintaining healthy ecosystems and sustaining cultural traditions. Through art, science, history, and storytelling, visitors will learn how fire can support biodiversity, enhance sources of food and medicine, and play a crucial role in Native basketry, regalia, and ceremony.
The exhibition begins with an immersive sensory environment simulating the experience of a cultural burn. Visitors hear the crackling of fire and joyful conversation as they encounter visuals of regrowth and regeneration—from basketry plants that rely on fire for their lifecycle, to baskets used for carrying babies, to stories that honor intergenerational traditions shaped by the skillful use of this elemental force. Grounding this experience, a map of California’s tribal territories highlights Native sovereignty and the deep, place-based knowledge that has informed these cultural practices for millennia.
This leads into the exhibition’s first section, “Working with Fire,” which features tools, narratives, and ecologies that underscore fire’s role in sustaining healthy ecosystems and Native ways of life.
Highlights include artworks by Harry Fonseca (Nisenan/Hawaiian/Portuguese), a fire story read by Linda Yamane (Rumsen Ohlone), and regalia by Tiśina Parker (Yosemite Southern Sierra Miwuk/Kucadikadi Mono Lake Paiute/Kashia Pomo), along with displays of plants whose seeds are stimulated by fire to germinate and cultural objects (regalia, baskets, etc.) dependent on fire.
The second section, “Good Fire, Interrupted,” confronts the colonial legacy of fire suppression, tracing how settler-colonialism criminalized cultural burns by Native people, contributing to degraded forests, biodiversity loss, and today’s megafires. Historical photographs, fire-scarred tree samples, and artworks by Brian D. Tripp (Karuk) and Saif Azzuz (Yurok/Libyan) examine environmental exploitation and the exclusion of Native stewardship from Native homelands.
The final section, “The Future of Fire,” looks forward. Several short films, including one by Roni Jo Draper (Yurok) and Marissa Lila Kongao, and another by Ashley Salaz (Coharie/Nahua) of Sogorea Te’ Land Trust, along with artwork by Renée Leann Castro-Ring (Ohlone), and baskets from Corine Pearce (Pomo), Patricia Franklin (Pomo), and the California Indian Basketweavers Association’s collection, illuminate ongoing resistance and cultural resilience. Visitors will learn about efforts like prairie restoration, Land Back campaigns, and collaborative cultural burns led by tribal communities across Northern California.
“This exhibition centers Native fire practitioners and culture bearers, whose knowledge is grounded in the specific ecologies of their homelands and thousands of years of experimentation,” says Ryder Diaz, OMCA Curator of Natural Sciences. “Good Fire invites visitors to expand their view of fire in Northern California and to respect and support the sovereignty of Native peoples, who have never ceded their right to care for their lands with fire.”
“From the very beginning, this exhibition has been shaped in close partnership with Native collaborators, whose guidance, stories, and practices are at the heart of Good Fire,” says Dr. Brittani R. Orona (Hupa), co-curator of the exhibition and Assistant Professor of Native American Studies at UC Davis. “By looking to their leadership, the exhibition not only honors traditions of the past, but also points to the future of land stewardship—one rooted in sovereignty, respect, and the continuance of relationships between people, fire, and place.”
PROJECT COLLABORATORS
Diana Almendariz, Cultural practitioner of Maidu/Wintun and Hupa/Yurok traditions
Weshoyot Alvitre, Tongva and Scottish, illustrator
Kimberly Avalos, photojournalist and producer
Elizabeth Azzuz, Cultural Fire Management Council, Director of Traditional Fire
Saif Azzuz, Yurok/Libyan, artist
California Indian Basketweavers’ Association Board of Directors
Roni Jo Draper, Yurok, filmmaker
Patricia Franklin, Scotts Valley Band of Pomo Indians, basketweaver
Chairman Ron Goode, North Fork Mono Tribe, fire practitioner
Don Hankins, Miwkoʔ (Plains Miwok), CSU Chico, professor
Inés Ixierda, Sogorea Te’ Land Trust
Frank Lake, Karuk, Fire Practitioner
Ayuthea LaPier, Fire Generation Collaborative
Leece LaRue, Karuk Tribe Memory Lab Project Manager
Marissa Lila Kongao, filmmaker
Alice Lincoln Cook, basketweaver, Karuk
Valentin Lopez, Amah Mutsun Tribal Band, Chairman
Timara Lotah Link, Chumash, mapmaker
Starla Madrigal, California Indian Basketweavers’ Association, Board Chairperson
Danny Manning, Asst. Fire Chief, Greenville Rancheria
Tony Marks-Block, Professor, CSU East Bay
Beth Rose Middleton Manning, UC Davis Department of Native American Studies, Professor
Victoria Montaño, Sogorea Te’ Land Trust
Peter Nelson, UC Berkeley, Assistant Professor
Tiśina Parker, Southern Sierra Miwuk/Kutzadika’a Mono Lake Paiute and Kashia Pomo/Coast Miwuk, Regalia maker
Corine Pearce, Pomo, basketweaver and educator
Vikki Preston, Karuk Tribe Department of Natural Resources, Cultural Resources Tech lll, artist
Fern Purdy, Cultural Fire Management Council
Jordan Reyes, Tribal EcoRestoration Alliance, Field Coordinator, Middletown Rancheria of Pomo Indians
Renee Ring Castro, Ohlone, artist
Margo Robbins, Cultural Fire Management Council, Co-Founder and Executive Director
Alyson Sagala, Tribal EcoRestoration Alliance, Operations Manager
Ashley Salaz, Sogorea Te’ Land Trust
Shingle Springs Band of Miwok Indians
Irene Vasquez, Southern Sierra Miwuk
Desiree Walker, Chukchansi, Animator and illustrator
Tracey Williams Hughey, North Fork Mono, basketweaver
Theresa Williams, North Fork Mono, basketweaver
Linda Yamane, Rumsen Ohlone, artist and historian
Read OMCA’s Native Accountability Statement and Land Acknowledgment here.
Download the press kit here.
Support for Good Fire: Tending Native Lands is generously provided by The Oakland Museum Women’s Board.
联系方式：
亚历克萨·戈特哈特|agotthardt@museumca.org| 330-472-3775（手机）
阿扎伊扎·希门尼斯 | ajimenez@museumca.org| 510-318-8467（手机）
关于加州奥克兰博物馆
加州奥克兰博物馆（OMCA）成立于1969年，作为一座“人民的博物馆”，致力于讲述加州艺术、历史和自然环境的多元故事。通过包容性的展览、公共项目和教育计划，OMCA为有意义的对话创造了空间，并致力于构建更加公平、富有同理心且紧密相连的社区。 OMCA拥有超过200万件艺术、历史及自然科学藏品，这些珍贵资源帮助人们深入理解加利福尼亚充满活力的文化遗产——所有这些都汇聚在其11万平方英尺的展厅空间和占地七英亩的园区内。作为湾区领先的文化机构，OMCA致力于营造一种氛围，让来自本地区、全州乃至世界各地的访客都能感受到被重视，并有能力共同塑造加利福尼亚文化景观的未来。
访客信息
奥克兰加州博物馆（OMCA）位于奥克兰市第 10 街橡树街 1000 号。博物馆普通门票 19 美元；老年人 16 美元；12 至 17 岁青少年、学生和教育工作者凭有效证件 12 美元；会员和 12 岁及以下儿童免费。大礼堂内的特别展览除普通票价外还收取 6 美元。OMCA 提供现场地下停车场，距离梅里特湖 BART 站仅一个街区，位于第 10 街和橡树街的拐角处，交通十分便利。 博物馆Oak Street 1000 号正门设有无障碍坡道。