Introduction

Fazal Sheikh

In December 2016, nearing the end of his term in office, President Obama designated the area surrounding Bears Ears, the twin sandstone buttes that dominate the landscape of southeastern Utah, as a National Monument. It gave protection to 1.35 million acres of lands sacred to the local Native American tribes, defending them against the threat of commercial and industrial exploitation. The president’s proclamation also secured tribal guidance for the management of their ancestral lands. But in December 2017, President Trump ordered an 85 percent reduction of the monument, from 1.35m acres to 201,397 acres, opening it up to potential exploitation by mining, fracking and natural gas, which had already destroyed much of the region’s natural landscape. That same year, through his friendship with the writer and conservationist Terry Tempest Williams, Sheikh was introduced to the members of Utah Diné Bikéyah, a coalition of the Hopi, Navajo, Ouray Ute, Ute Mountain Ute and Zuni tribes formed to fight the policy and maintain their native lands. They invited Sheikh to join them as artist-in-residence, and between 2017 and 2022 he photographed the region and its people, working with the tribal communities and their elders, including Jonah Yellowman (Diné), Spiritual Advisor to Utah Diné Bikéyah and one of its founding members. In October 2021, President Biden restored protection for Bears Ears, along with other National Monuments, part of a pledge to conserve what remains of the natural landscape and those areas sacred to tribal communities.