ZINTKA!

A mixed-media book—including original song lyrics and artwork—telling the story of Zintkála Nuni’s tragic life.

This companion book to the award-winning short film Lost Bird (Zintkála Nuni) begins with the lyrics—only one or two lines per page—to Colerick’s song “Little Bird—(Lost Bird of Wounded Knee)” (the sheet music for which is included at the book’s conclusion). It tells the story of Zintka, who, as an infant, survived a three-day blizzard in the arms of her dying mother in the aftermath of the Wounded Knee Massacre. The dominant feature of each page is the artwork, done in a style Feldmann calls “animontage,” which is based on the Plains Indians’ ledger art of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Feldmann “created digital ledger art using backgrounds of broken treaties, telegraphs, and handwritten military documents. On top of them [he] placed drawings by Lakota artists of the era.” The lyrics convey the loss and desolation Zintka faced after being adopted by an army general who forged his wife’s signature in court before leaving the two of them in poverty years later: “Lost in a Ghost Dance / Spirits have come looking for you / They won’t rest until you’re home / Little bird / Troubled child / You can feel your mother’s love / And frozen fingers.” Feldmann’s prose retelling of Zintka’s life and death, which makes up the book’s second half, is handled with both compassion and matter-of-factness. Haunting images, like a close-up of a man’s gloved hand holding (strangling?) a shadowy bird surrounded by buffalo skulls, add an extra emotional layer to Zintka’s remarkable story. A timeline spanning from her birth in 1890 to 1991, when her body was exhumed and reburied at Wounded Knee, helps put the events in context. All of these elements ultimately combine to provide an unforgettable glimpse into a particularly dark time in America’s history.

A poignant multimedia journey that beautifully combines art, music, and the written word to detail a long-overlooked life.