Video Girls and Video Songs for Navajo Sky

1973, 31:56 min, b&w and color, sound

Kubota narrates this surrealistic video diary of her month-long sojourn with a Navajo family on a reservation in Chinle, Arizona. She talks to the women as they cross the desert in a horse-drawn carriage to fetch water from the nearest well, and captures footage of tribal songs and dances, children's pranks and a local rodeo. Despite the language barrier between the Japanese Kubota and the English-speaking Native Americans, the artist befriends her subjects through sheer force of personality. Kubota relates to her subjects less like a documentary observer and more like a distant relative, with humor and affection.

Special Thanks: Cecilia Sandoval, Ruth Yazzie, Evon Shirley, Mary Lucier, Randy Feinstein, Pat Faust, Penny Schwartz, Geoffrey Leighton, Bobby Burns, Lance Wisniewski, John Trayna, Paul Doughorty, Danil Restuccio, Carl Geiger. Video Tape Editor: George Palmer. Thanks Also: Electronic Arts Intermix. WNET TV Lab. Post Production: Synapse of Syracuse University, Union at the Newhouse Communications Center, with Assistance from the College of Visual and Performing Arts, New York State Council on the Arts. My Love to Chinle, Arizona.