Native Lights: Where Indigenous Voices Shine

Our guest today is a photographer who takes some stunning photos of wildlife. We're very excited to speak with Michael Kurtz (Tasunka Opi). He's Sicangu Lakota, enrolled in the Lower Brule Sioux Tribe. He runs Lakota Photography, blending wildlife photography, tracking, and cultural education. He's also a naturalist and has volunteered with groups like the National Park Service and Project Coyote. He has spent countless hours across the Dakotas, Minnesota, and beyond, capturing wildlife in its natural habitat. Currently, he's supervisor of programming and interpretation with Hoċokata Ṫi Cultural Center at the Shakopee Mdewakanton Sioux community. Michael's first camera was a Fisher Price kid's model, which he used to photograph toy dinosaurs. That early interest, paired with a love of the natural world, laid out his life's path as a wildlife photographer and naturalist.  He gives us his photography tips, weighs in on camouflage and scenting, reveals the once-in-a-lifetime wildlife shot he still can't believe he got and explains why he's putting off photographing a wolverine till retirement. He also talks birding and attempts his favorite birdcall.-----Hosts / Producers: Leah Lemm, Cole Premo Editor: Britt Aamodt Editorial support: Emily Krumberger Mixing & mastering: Chris Harwood  Michael Kurtz [photo credit: Michael Kurtz] -----For the latest episode drops and updates, follow us on social media. instagram.com/ampersradio/instagram.com/mnnativenews/ Never miss a beat. Sign up for our email list to receive news, updates and content releases from AMPERS. ampers.org/about-ampers/staytuned/ This show is made possible by community support. Due to cuts in federal funding, the community radio you love is at risk. Your support is needed now more than ever. Donate now to power the community programs you love: ampers.org/fund

On this episode, we speak with contemporary artist and White Earth Nation citizen Kent Estey. Kent paints at his home studio in Naytahwaush, in the heart of the White Earth Reservation. He's known for really bold abstract landscapes, acrylic, oil, ink, and metal. He’s also an author. In 2025, he released the children's book Picking Sweetgrass. His latest exhibit, "Mino-Bimaadiziwin: The Good Life" runs through Labor Day weekend in Detroit Lakes: https://project412mn.org/Estey-The-Good-Life-Art/. Kent shares why he believes his community is the best place to live and to make his work, and how he’s turned his rural studio into a hub of his art merchandizing. Kent tells us how his success is due in large part to Becky, his wife and partner in the business.  Kent’s grandmother was a nationally recognized black ash basket maker. Before she was a well-known artist, she was an Ojibwe girl from White Earth who’d been stripped of her culture and language by boarding schools. She never again spoke Ojibwe with her family. But, she made traditional black ash baskets the rest of her life. Kent explains how those baskets became her language and how he’s kept her legacy alive in his own creations.  When Kent started out, he got a great piece of advice: Don’t settle on being a starving artist. If you’re starving, you’re not doing the right work. Find out what it is and do it.-----Hosts / Producers: Leah Lemm, Cole Premo Editor: Britt Aamodt Editorial support: Emily Krumberger Mixing & mastering: Chris Harwood -----For the latest episode drops and updates, follow us on social media. instagram.com/ampersradio/instagram.com/mnnativenews/ Never miss a beat. Sign up for our email list to receive news, updates and content releases from AMPERS. ampers.org/about-ampers/staytuned/ This show is made possible by community support. Due to cuts in federal funding, the community radio you love is at risk. Your support is needed now more than ever. Donate now to power the community programs you love: ampers.org/fund

We are very excited to speak with Rafael Gonzalez, aka, Tufawon. He is a Mdewakanton Dakota and Boricua (Puerto Rican). He's a rapper, singer-songwriter, and producer who calls South Minneapolis home. In addition to his music making, he's an educator. He teaches youth music production, songwriting, and recording through his music production program ".WAVWARRIOR".  Rafael joins us from Aguada, Puerto Rico, the mountainous home of his Boricua family. Puerto Rico and its musical heritage would eventually play a large role in the sounds he brought to the Minneapolis scene that gave rise to him as an artist. He talks about the support of the Minneapolis rap community when he was starting out, and how a group of Lakota and Dakota water protectors became his music mentors.  He reveals his biggest fear as a performer, why he believes in the next generation of creators and why he'll never step away from music making. He also shares clips of two new tracks from his EP Gradient.-----Hosts / Producers: Leah Lemm, Cole Premo Editor: Britt Aamodt Editorial support: Emily Krumberger Mixing & mastering: Chris Harwood Image: Rafael Gonzalez [photo credit: Rafael Gonzalez]Music: "Colorful" from EP Gradient (2026), written and produced by Tufawon, courtesy of Rafael Gonzalez/Tufawon. [00:00:28]"Wandering" from EP Gradient (2026), written and produced by Tufawon, courtesy of Rafael Gonzalez/Tufawon. [00:01:00] -----For the latest episode drops and updates, follow us on social media. instagram.com/ampersradioinstagram.com/mnnativenewsfacebook.com/MNNativeNewsNever miss a beat. Sign up for our email list to receive news, updates and content releases from AMPERS. ampers.org/about-ampers/staytuned/ This show is made possible by community support. Due to cuts in federal funding, the community radio you love is at risk. Your support is needed now more than ever. Donate now to power the community programs you love: ampers.org/fund 

Today, we're very excited to Welcome Alexandera Houchin to the Native Lights podcast. Alexandera is a citizen of the Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior Chippewa (Ojibwe). She resides in her reservation community in northern Minnesota. She's an ultra racer, bike packer, mountain biker, outdoor adventurer, storyteller, and writer. And she is currently working on her memoir for Penguin Random House and is the subject of a documentary. Alexandera shares her story of growing up apart from her Ojibwe roots. Her mother had been adopted and spent the first 19 years of Alexandera's life trying to track down her Native birth family.  As an adult, Alexandera got her first bike to replace a car that no longer worked. But soon, she was sucked into the exciting world of bike tours and ultra endurance events, multi-day races over hundreds of miles. She tells us how the long stretches of open road helped her cultivate healing and a place for ceremony. She also opens up about how her racing career led her to become a writer and how following her passion—along with setting records in some intense, grueling races—led to a documentary project and an unexpected invitation to write a book.-----Hosts / Producers: Leah Lemm, Cole Premo Editor: Britt Aamodt Editorial support: Emily Krumberger Mixing & mastering: Chris Harwood -----For the latest episode drops and updates, follow us on social media. instagram.com/ampersradioinstagram.com/mnnativenewsfacebook.com/MNNativeNewsNever miss a beat. Sign up for our email list to receive news, updates and content releases from AMPERS. ampers.org/about-ampers/staytuned/ This show is made possible by community support. Due to cuts in federal funding, the community radio you love is at risk. Your support is needed now more than ever. Donate now to power the community programs you love: ampers.org/fund

On this episode Leah and Cole speak with Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe citizen Bradley Harrington who recently penned an article in the Mille Lacs Band newspaper, Ojibwe Inaajimowin, about 250 years of US occupation as the country marks the anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence.   Bradley delves into the politics that led to the European occupation of the continent, and how a belief that the land was theirs by divine right and Supreme Court lawmaking ignored thousands of years of Native history and stewardship. He shares what the country's 250th anniversary might look like from the perspective of an Anishinaabe citizen. He also catches us up on what's happened in his life since Leah and Cole last spoke to him in 2022. How a career shift has made it possible for him to devote more time to making the Ojibwe language accessible to learners. How years after his own incarceration he is going behind bars to be of service to prisoners. And, how learning ceremony from his elders has led him to connect with the larger Anishinaabe community.-----Hosts / Producers: Leah Lemm, Cole Premo Editor: Britt Aamodt Editorial support: Emily Krumberger Mixing & mastering: Chris Harwood -----For the latest episode drops and updates, follow us on social media. instagram.com/ampersradioinstagram.com/mnnativenewsfacebook.com/MNNativeNewsNever miss a beat. Sign up for our email list to receive news, updates and content releases from AMPERS. ampers.org/about-ampers/staytuned/ This show is made possible by community support. Due to cuts in federal funding, the community radio you love is at risk. Your support is needed now more than ever. Donate now to power the community programs you love: ampers.org/fund