From the Artist

In my work composition, balance in the painted surface and aesthetics are more important than the articulation of meaning. If an image succeeds in making a statement—exciting. In order to keep a narrative piece open-ended, I commonly shoot images so that the models' faces are not seen. Viewers are allowed to make their own interpretation. I try not to capitalize on the spiritualism of my heritage by giving the impression that I have, through images, a monopoly on the spirit world. My work is down to earth and dirty: it deals with sex, food, and money, the politics between men and women, the human spirit, the need to communicate, and the importance of humor in that quest.
_{—From Brandywine Workshop and Archives records}

The motivation behind my work as an artist is the same universal impulse that has always driven artists—the need to communicate based on knowledge and truth. The iconography in my work, by that I mean the props and costumes, is a private symbolism rather than one imposed by the dominant culture. The symbolism and mythology that dominant society attaches to indigenous people is nothing more than a salve for a troubled collective conscience. I have no need for that kind of mythology and symbolism. I attempt to imply a timelessness in my work which stimulates feelings that represent past, present, and future. Photographs are typified by posed models either against a simple background or, at times, against a background of actual nature. The rugged terrain of Northern Arizona or the mountains and clouds of New Mexico may serve as a backdrop to the politics played out symbolically between men and women. Models' faces are not seen in several of the staged images in order to suggest movement or solitary journeys that were dreamy visual poems.
_{—Excerpted from https://archive.org/details/stjamesguidetona0000unse/page/314/mode/
1up?q=carm+little+turtle, accessed 6-14-2021}