In the middle of Sickels Plaza at San Diego State University, surrounded by shady tipu trees and fragrant sage, a new sculpture honors Kumeyaay history and culture in San Diego County. The piece, “Return of the Kumeyaay Creator,” is shaped like the sun, with red-orange rays that reach toward the trees and the sky beyond. It glows when midday sunlight hits it. The sculpture, installed Thursday, is the latest piece in the Living Land Acknowledgement, a sculptural art project at SDSU that aims to share the story of the Kumeyaay people and their continued presence on campus and in the region. It’s a project that’s especially welcome for some Indigenous students and faculty on a campus that in recent years had backed away from such statements and faced criticism for its handling of tribal artifacts. Kumeyaay artist Johnny Bear Contreras speaks at San Diego State University commemorating the launch of the Living Land Acknowledgment, a series of sculptures with a modern tech twist ushering SDSU’s Kumeyaay Land Acknowledgment into the physical and virtual spaces on Sept. 27, 2024. (Ariana Drehsler / For The San Diego Union-Tribune) Johnny Bear Contreras, the Kumeyaay artist behind the series and a member of the San Pasqual Band of Mission Indians, spoke about the works Friday afternoon at an unveiling celebration. “Each ray of the sun represents a generation,” he said. “These are all just different aspects of our life that has been, that is and (that’ll) be the future.” Located along busy corridors on campus, each piece in the Living Land Acknowledgement — all created by Contreras — features a display with a QR code that visitors can use to access a video or augmented reality experience to learn more about the project and the Kumeyaay. The first three installed sculptures were celebrated on Friday, California Native American Day, which is meant to recognize the cultural contributions of Indigenous people throughout the state. The final three will be installed by early next year. SDSU’s Imperial Valley campus will also get four sculptures. The Living Land Acknowledgement is an addition to the university’s spoken land acknowledgement, a formalized statement that recognizes the Indigenous inhabitants of the land as its traditional stewards. The university has had a Kumeyaay land acknowledgement since 2019. Chair of Tribal Relations at SDSU Jacob Alvarado Waipuk speaks at San Diego State University commemorating the launch of the Living Land Acknowledgment, a series of sculptures with a modern tech twist ushering SDSU’s Kumeyaay Land Acknowledgment into the physical and virtual spaces on Sept. 27, 2024. (Ariana Drehsler / For The San Diego Union-Tribune) “Our history is not just written in the books or carved in stone; it is alive in the land beneath our feet, the sky above and the traditions we carry forward to this very day,” Jacob Alvarado Waipuk, SDSU’s tribal liaison and a San Pasqual tribal member, said Friday. “These sculptures are more than just art,” he said later. “They reflect the partnership and collaboration between the Kumeyaay Nation and San Diego State community.” The project is a collaboration between a number of campus organizations — the school’s Native Resource Center, SDSU Story Lab, Virtual Immersive Teaching and Learning Research Center and Division of Student Affairs and Campus Diversity. The first sculpture, “Stargazer,” installed in March in front of Hepner Hall, features a man’s face angled toward the sky, eyes closed. It’s accompanied by an immersive virtual performance of a Kumeyaay bird song by Blue Eagle Vigil and his daughter Lovely Vigil. At the second sculpture, “People of the Sun,” installed in July near the North Library Quad, there’s footage of Mike Connolly, the author of SDSU’s land acknowledgment, explaining the project. The sculpture includes two faces — a man and a woman — emerging from poppy flowers and relates to the people’s connection to the land, Contreras said. A sculpture a part of the Living Land Acknowledgement project, an art installation that helps tell the story of the Kumeyaay people, created by Johnny Bear Contreras, is installed outside Manchester Hall on San Diego State campus on Thursday, Sept. 26, 2024 in San Diego, CA. (Meg McLaughlin / The San Diego Union-Tribune) “Return of the Kumeyaay Creator,” which represents the Kumeyaay creation story, is accompanied by a video of Contreras in his studio, discussing the work. Combining art with technology takes the learning experience to a “deeper level,” said Stuart Voytilla, the faculty lead at the SDSD Story Lab who helped bring the project together. “We’re actually opening up as a virtual world, in addition to a physical world, and truly transforming a spoken land acknowledgement,” Voytilla said. The Living Land Acknowledgement project has been underway for several years, but Chris Medellin, the university’s Native Resource Center director, said the project felt especially important to Indigenous students in 2022. That year, the University Senate overturned a rule that required faculty to include the land acknowledgement in course syllabi — a move that “created an emotional response” from Indigenous students and advocates, he said. The land acknowledgement is now an optional addition to course syllabi. “That was very disheartening for us,” said Aiyiana Tiger, a first-year graduate student in multicultural community counseling who is Choctaw, Seminole and Creek, as well Chamorro, a Pacific Island people. “It solidified that we need to get these (sculptures) out now.” For Tiger, who said she almost dropped out her first year of undergrad at SDSU because she didn’t see Native students like herself represented on campus, seeing the land acknowledgement in syllabi “helps students feel welcome and that they belong.” SDSU President Adela de la Torre speaks at San Diego State University commemorating the launch of the Living Land Acknowledgment, a series of sculptures with a modern tech twist ushering SDSU’s Kumeyaay Land Acknowledgment into the physical and virtual spaces on Sept. 27, 2024. (Ariana Drehsler / For The San Diego Union-Tribune) While the land acknowledgement is optional for course syllabi, SDSU said in a statement that it is customary for the land acknowledgement to be recited at many campus events, including convocation and graduation. “The university has long affirmed its commitment to acknowledging Native and Indigenous people and has taken specific action in support of the Kumeyaay,” the university said. It pointed to the opening of the Native Resource Center, the creation of the tribal liaison position and a partnership with the Kumeyaay Community College to better support Indigenous transfer students. But some say that more can be done. Last year, a state audit found that SDSU was one of several universities in possession of thousands of Indigenous artifacts and remains — and far behind on returning those items to Indigenous owners, including the Kumeyaay. As of last July, SDSU had more than 90,000 Indigenous artifacts and remains in its collection. The university said in a statement this week that it is “actively in consultation with culturally-affiliated tribes and working toward the repatriation of all ancestors.” The school’s next inventory period will be completed at the end of this academic year, officials said. “We want those remains returned to our people, so we can repatriate them … in a proper, cultural, dignified manner,” said Stan Rodriguez, a professor of Kumeyaay language and humanities at the Kumeyaay Community College. “So although they are taking steps, there are many parts or segments of this university where they do need to catch up.” Ethan Banegas echoes the sentiment. He is a lecturer at SDSU and the culture bearer in residence at UC San Diego, where he imparts his knowledge of the Kumeyaay people to the campus community. Banegas, a descendant of the Kumeyaay and other bands of Native Americans, says land acknowledgements can feel performative if not followed up with real action. He is working on writing a land acknowledgement for UC San Diego and says he wants it to have educational elements, including information about a Kumeyaay village that was located near the UC San Diego campus. “We’re making great gains,” Banegas said. “But a land acknowledgement is only good if it’s just the beginning of a thousand steps.”