Smoky Valley (Native American) Village Site Circa 1000-1500 AD, Saline County, Kansas Possibly 1992 - 1993

Terry Evans made this black and white photograph of the Smoky Valley in Kansas, a Native American village site, in the late 20th century. Evans's work often grapples with the layered histories etched into landscapes. She returns us to the period between 1000 and 1500 AD, compelling us to consider the lives of the people who once inhabited this land, and their relationship to it. The aerial perspective transforms the village site into an abstract composition. The circular patterns and subtle indentations in the earth hint at human presence, yet nature persists. Evans captures the tension between the land's original inhabitants and the agricultural landscape. It’s impossible to ignore the traces of cultivation that now mark the area. Evans once said, "I am photographing the prairie to try to understand how we treat a place." Here, the prairie becomes a palimpsest. What do we choose to remember, and what do we allow to fade?