43.5” x 58” each
Digital Photography, Fine Art Giclée print on 260 gsm premium luster photo paper.

Artist Statement:

When fire is viewed only as a force of destruction and not for its transformative and life-giving qualities, our relation to it is reduced from awe and wonder to simply fear. It is in Indigenous communities that fire is recognized in the fullness of its transformative capabilities. We are taught to respect the power of fire as a spiritual force, something to be revered and respected precisely for its power to transform as well as destroy.

During the Disturbance Bootcamp in April 2026, we spent the better part of a week visiting burn scars, learning from forest service experts and fire ecology scientists. We confronted the grief and hardships of people whose lives have been impacted by wildfire and their justified anger and fear towards the systems in place to handle or mitigate its destructive power, and the subsequent loss of lives and property when those systems fail. As I reflected on the experience, I perceived a chasm in the expression of emotion between the communities affected by wildfire and the scientists who study it. On one side there was grief, fear, vitriol and distrust right at the surface and on the other side an academic detachment that I sensed may be a coping mechanism to handle the immensity of the threat to all our forests if we do not address the systemic issues inherent to western modes of fire management.

In the process of developing artwork post-Bootcamp I became interested in the elements of the narrative that were missing that contributed to creating this emotional chasm. I was drawn to the writing of fire historian Stephen Pynes who began to answer this question for me in his two page commentary A uniquely fire creature, a uniquely fire planet published in the journal Ideas in Ecology and Evolution in 2020. He describes a fundamental misunderstanding of fire in academic disciplines writing, “Fire is not simply a ‘disturbance’ that impinges upon the living world; it is a creation of the living world.” He expresses fire as a fundamental biological force tied to human life and evolution, that was abandoned by the scientific field of biology, and instead relegated to forestry “which didn’t want it and then reluctantly studied it in order to control, and if possible, evict it.” (Pynes, “Uniquely fire creature,” 59.)

Fire is as familiar to us as breathing and eating. The same process of combustion that turns wood to heat and flame is the same process of combustion that converts our food to energy within the cells of our bodies. Yet fire is also foreign. Humans are beings of substance and matter whereas fire has no substance, though it also lives and consumes. The idea of fire as an entity, a presence that inspires both familiarity and fear is what I am exploring with my art. My photographs attempt to capture the feeling of fire as a familiar and foreboding figure, a dually destructive and transformative force. The recognition of fire as a relative and as a reflection of our own humanity is what I felt was missing from the discussion. I am grateful to Stephen Pynes for using his position as an expert to appeal to ecologists and evolutionary biologists to recognize this longstanding relationship between humans and fire. He concludes his commentary with, “The human presence—the human fire presence—is so powerful an ecological and evolutionary force that it is now impossible to talk coherently about fire on Earth today without including people.” (Pynes, “Uniquely fire creature,” 60.)

References:

Stephen J. Pynes. “A uniquely fire creature, a uniquely fire planet.” Ideas in Ecology and Evolution, vol.13 (2020): 59-60. doi:10.24908/iee.

Artist Bio:

Cedar Rose is an interdisciplinary Indigenous artist from Santa Fe, located in the traditional

Tewa Territory of northern New Mexico. She is Holikachuk Dene (Athabaskan) and Diné

(Navajo). Her artistic work combines various materials including textiles, photography, paper

ephemera, and found objects, to create clothing, collages, installations, and assemblages. 

Cedar Rose has been involved in performance art since childhood and is one of the five founding members of a collaborative performance art troupe in Santa Fe, NM. She earned her bachelor's degree in Business Administration from Fort Lewis College in Durango, CO in 2015 and is currently working towards her MFA in Studio Arts from the Institute of American Indian Arts.

Cedar Rose has lived and worked as both an artist and business professional on the East and

West coasts of the United States. She now resides in her hometown of Santa Fe.

Scientists Statement:

FIRE REGIME

(fy-uh ray-zheem)

Fire does not have a single personality. It behaves differently from place to place and from one ecosystem to another. Ecologists describe these recurring patterns as a fire regime: the characteristic frequency, severity, intensity, seasonality, size, and spatial pattern of fire within an ecosystem.

Two important parts of a fire regime are intensity and severity. Though often used interchangeably, they describe different things. Fire intensity describes the fire itself—how much energy it releases and how vigorously it burns. Flame length, temperature, and rate of spread are expressions of intensity. Fire severity describes what the fire leaves behind: the degree to which vegetation, soils, and other ecosystem components are changed.

Think of intensity as an expression of fire’s personality and severity as the effect that personality has on a particular place.

A fast-moving grass fire can burn intensely but pass quickly, leaving many plants alive below ground. A slower fire burning through heavy woody fuels may transfer heat into soils for much longer, producing more severe ecological effects. In ponderosa pine forests, frequent surface fires historically removed grasses, needles, and young trees while many mature trees survived. In higher-elevation spruce-fir forests, fires have generally occurred less frequently but can produce extensive tree mortality when they do occur.

There is no single kind of “natural” fire. Different ecosystems evolved with different fire regimes, and those regimes produce different patterns of plant survival, mortality, and renewal. Other species that inhabit an ecosystem — including humans — adapt to these recurring patterns of disturbance.

These images personify the different personalities of fire. It can be fast or slow, mellow or intense, restrained or extreme. Those traits shape what survives and what is changed.

PHOTOS BY ALEX CANCRO