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Scrapbook of a Taos Hippie: book signing with author Iris Keltz at Starr Interiors, Taos, New Mexico
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Iris Keltz, author - Scrapbook of a Taos Hippie
Author Iris Keltz will be signing her book "Scrapbook of a Taos Hippie" at Starr Interiors, 117 Paseo del Pueblo Norte, Taos, New Mexico (2 Doors South of the Taos Inn) from 12 noon until 4 pm, July 12, 2009.
The booksigning is in conjunction with the Taos Summer of Love Celebration.
Her book, “Scrapbook of a Taos Hippie” has become the definitive reference to the early seventies in Taos during the counter culture movement of that time. The featured photos by noted photographer, Paul Dembski, with her descriptive stories of the people portrayed, capture the magic of those moments in an important chronicle of those very special times.
This is the second event held by Starr Interiors to feature a specific artist in the Taos Summer of Love celebration. Don’t miss this special event and the opportunity to meet the author.
Scrapbook of a Taos Hippie
by Iris Keltz
Cinco Puntos Press
Paperback
10-digit ISBN 0-938317-50-4
13-digit ISBN 978-0-938317-50-0
The '6os — the music, the clothes, the political and sexual idealism, the experimentation with drugs, the hunger for peace, creativity, and sharing were a watershed in the way America sees itself. Hippie culture was at the very zenith of that watershed, and Taos was its beating heart, a Mecca that beckoned young pilgrims from all over the country. Iris Keltz was one of those pilgrims who came to Taos in the '6os. She stayed to become a folk historian of the tribe.
Iris' book has all the old timey vibes of a family scrapbook, a marvelous collection of stories and oral histories from the people who lived in the communes that flourished in Taos Morningstar, New Buffalo, Lama, Reality Construction Company, and others. Here, decades later, they talk openly about communal life, about making adobes and growing gardens, about natural childbirth and raising children, about New Age mysticism and the Native American Church, about money and food stamps, about regret and what's been learned. Scrapbook of a Taos Hippie is full of wonderful then and now photographs with up to date biographies, newspaper articles, and other memorabilia that give the reader a true sense of the passionate life of hippies during the great flowering of communes in New Mexico. (from book review)
"This is a clear and dedicated account of how we lived and who we were, written with an alert eye and a big open hearted, humorous voice. Keltz leads us deep into a particular American landscape with beautiful prose that makes us want to follow her."
—Natalie Goldberg
About Iris Keltz:
Iris Keltz, author of Scrapbook of a Taos Hippie, first arrived in northern New Mexico the summer that Woodstock was happening on the East Coast. Fresh from the Lower East Side, Iris and her Palestinian husband were embraced by the inhabitants of the New Buffalo Commune. Iris fell in love with the land, the culture and the diversity of people. She stayed to make northern New Mexico her home to this day. Although her grown children have left for the East and West Coasts, Iris still wanders the Rio Grande Valley between Albuquerque and Taos.
Scrapbook of a Taos Hippie is filled with eye witness accounts, oral histories, historical photographs, newspaper articles from local and alternative presses and other memorabilia, creating a clear picture of the perils and pitfalls of young idealistic city folk trying to create a utopian back to the land society.
Keltz cut her eye teeth as an activist on the Lower East Side where a group of New York Jewish and Arab activists held benefits and teach-ins, trying to raise awareness of the situation back in the Middle East. She joined Abby Hoffman, Jerry Rubin and thousands of others at the Democratic Convention in Chicago in 1968 to support the nomination of Senator Eugene McCarthy who promised to stop the Viet Nam War.
Before the summer of love, Iris was caught in the ’67 War, where she was living with a Palestinian family from Jerusalem. The repercussions of that unresolved war still festers. While visiting a Palestinian village near Hebron, Keltz came to understand that village life was the sustainable antidote to a consumer society that offers comforts, toys and technology but leaves people alienated and never satiated. Village life became her ideal. For over forty years, she has shared stories about her experiences in the Middle East and the counter-culture of northern New Mexico.
As a reading teacher for the Albuquerque Public Schools for over twenty-five years, Keltz brought her love of reading, writing and story telling to her students. Now retired, she is free to harvest all the stories to pass on to her brand new grandson and the next generation.
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