2026 TUXUUNGA INDIGENOUS PEOPLES DAY

THEME: NATURE AS RELATIVES
SUNDAY, OCTOBER 11, 2026
11:00 AM – 4:30 PM
12400 Big Tujunga Canyon Road, Tujunga, CA 91042

How do we honor, celebrate, uplift, and learn from Indigenous Peoples in ways that nurture both community and the land? How can we collectively heal the devastating wounds of colonialism, land and cultural loss, and the ongoing erasure of Indigenous voices?

At Tuxuunga — "The Place of the Old Woman" — we gather for the 6th Annual Indigenous Peoples Day to reaffirm Indigenous cultures, contributions, and visionary leadership. Together, under the mother oak, we celebrate this year's theme: Nature As Relatives — honoring the interconnected kinship between people, land, water, and all living beings. This relational worldview guides our shared responsibility to the earth and connects us through ceremony, song, art, food, and community.

This year, we will highlight the Rights of Nature through panels, cultural presentations, and workshops — exploring how Indigenous knowledge systems recognize the land, water, and all beings as living relatives with inherent rights to exist, thrive, and be protected.

This free, family-friendly event is organized by ST Forward with special guidance from Indigenous Culture Bearer and Advisor Tina Orduno Calderon, and support from the Mountains Recreation and Conservation Authority (MRCA).

Our celebration is shaped by these values:

Respect for the land
A focus on reciprocity
Relational educational opportunities
Cultural diversity
Generative dialogue

Presenters and Workshop Facilitators

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TINA CALDERON

Tina Orduno Calderon is a Culture Bearer for her family; the descendants of Komiikranga of the Santa Monica mountains which is shared territory for the Chumash and Tongva. Tina is wife, mother, grandmother, sister and auntie to many.

Tina is a singer who also enjoys creative writing and composing poems and songs. To date she has composed over a dozen songs in her ancestral languages of Tongvé and Chumash.

Additionally, Tina is a traditional dancer and storyteller who strongly believes in honoring her ancestors by sharing their history, educating others about Indigenous truths and inspiring others to respect the land, waters, sacred elements and environment.

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TED GARCIA

Ted Garcia Jr. (Tataviam/Chumash/Serrano) teaches about traditional lifeways through song and storytelling. Enrolled with the Fernandeño-Tataviam Band of Mission Indians, Ted traces his ancestry to individuals who lived at Chaguayabit village (today’s Castaic Junction) and elsewhere in the greater Santa Clarita Valley, southern Antelope Valley and San Fernando Valley at the time of European contact in 1769 and for a thousand years before that.

Ted Garcia, a spiritual advisor to the annual Hart of the West Powwow at William S. Hart Park in Newhall, is also an accomplished stone carver.

VIRGINIA CARMELO

Virginia Carmelo was born in Orange County, California. Her paternal side is Gabrielino/Tongva and Digueno/Kumeyaay tribes. Virginia received her B.A. from CSU, Fullerton, in Ethnic Studies. During that time, being influenced by and involved in the social movements of the sixties, she began dance studies that led her to study indigenous dance with two prominent masters in the Los Angeles area. Currently, they take part in preserving and sharing the Tongva culture. The family endeavors to revitalizeTongva tribal song, dance, and regalia.

Today, the group “Toveema” can be seen performing both ancient and modern tribal song and dance at many prominent venues throughout Southern California. They take pride in the making of all regalia and instruments, using natural indigenous materials.

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LAZARO ARVIZU

Lazaro Arvizu Jr. is an artist, educator, musician, and researcher dedicated to the culture of the first people of Los Angeles. Born in the Los Angeles Basin, he is knowledgeable of the landscape and cosmology of the Gabrieleno culture. He has worked for over 20 years facilitating creative and meaningful cultural experiences to people of all ages and walks of life, in many venues.

MEZTLI PROJECTS

Meztli Projects is an Indigenous based arts & culture collaborative centering Indigeneity into the creative practice of Los Angeles by using arts-based strategies to support, advocate for, and organize to highlight Native and Indigenous Artists and systems-impacted youth.

Meztli Projects operates out of Apachianga (East Los Angeles) in Tovaangar (Los Angeles County), lands stewarded since time immemorial by families and villages now known as the Acjachemen, Chumash, Tataviam and Tongva Tribal Nations.

DYANN DOMINGUEZ
A proud member of the Chumash community, Dyann is also known as Wyann Womin, or Smuwič in her native language. Her ancestral villages are in Santa Barbara and Ventura. She is a member of the Chumash Cultural Collective, where she works with Indigenous sisters to preserve traditions and culture through Indigenous language, song, and dance. As a Certified California Naturalist and Climate Steward, she dedicates herself to protecting the land and water entrusted to by her ancestors, passionate about passing on Traditional Ecological knowledge to the next generation.

TONATZIN CARMELO

Tonantzin Carmelo is an acclaimed Indigenous and Latina actress whose career spans film, television, theater, music, dance, and motion‑capture performance. She first gained national recognition in Steven Spielberg’s Into the West, earning multiple honors including a SAG Award nomination. Her screen work includes leading roles in the indie film Imprint and the video game Dead Space, along with recent starring and guest‑starring roles on NBC’s La Brea, BBC’s The English, CBS’s NCIS: Origins, and AMC’s Dark Winds.

Music and dance are at the core of Tonantzin’s artistic origins. As a recording artist, she has collaborated with Canyon Records, contributing to three Pre‑Columbian music albums. As a choreographer, her credits include Amazon’s Undone and the Industry’s opera Sweetland. She is the lead artist and founder of Toveema, a Tongva song ensemble dedicated to preserving traditional songs and creating new works. She is also a contemporary songwriter, co‑writing “Nyum Nyum,” an indie hit in Indonesia.

Rooted in Los Angeles/Yaanga, Tovaangar, her ancestral Tongva homeland, Tonantzin continues her work as an actor, musician, dancer, naturalist, and cultural educator.

ABIGAIL GONZALEZ

Abigail Gonzalez is a first generation Mexican American naturalist, activist, and visual storyteller from South Bay, Los Angeles. Her work lives at the intersection of land, memory, art, and community. Through urban ecological restoration and environmental justice, she encourages younger generations to build reciprocal relationships with the natural world through play, exploration, and the belief that we are more likely to protect what we have first learned to know and love. While Abigail is not of Tongva descent, she recognizes Los Angeles as the traditional, ancestral, and unceded homelands of the Tongva and other Indigenous peoples of the region. She approaches this work with humility, carrying forward knowledge shared with her by cultural advisors while honoring its origins and the people who have stewarded these lands since time immemorial. At the heart of Abigail’s practice is the belief that our relationship with the land is also a relationship with one another, with those who came before us, and with those who have yet to arrive.

DINA KHATIB

Dina Khatib is a Palestinian-Jordanian environmentalist, educator, and social justice activist. She was born in Amman, Jordan, and has grown up moving between the modern-day United States and Southwest Asia. Balancing both worlds, she learned that her roots are embedded within her through her ancestors. Her north star comes from her Palestinian lineage, which fuels the inspiration behind her work. With a bachelor’s degree in Marine Science from the University of Hawaii at Hilo, Dina has always had a connection to water. She now realizes it was really a connection to the idea of liberation.

She is especially called to the intersection of environmental and social justice. Her current endeavor, Sacred Rage Collective, is rooted in her ancestral rage to drive transformative change through art, education, and storytelling. She believes standing in solidarity means recognizing that collective liberation for indigenous peoples everywhere is bound together, and that healing the land requires honoring all who have been forcibly separated from it.

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CHEF LOUIE

Raised in Boyle Heights, Chef Louie's journey is deeply rooted in his Navajo and Apache heritage. His grandmother (age 103) is a living repository of Navajo tradition and boarding school stories, and has been a guiding light in his life. Inspired by his grandmother's resilience, Chef Louie, along with his son, embarked on a culinary journey by attending culinary school. Through his passion for food, he keeps his family's heritage close to his heart. Despite never venturing beyond the borders of the United States, Louie is a champion for refugees and asylum seekers, understanding the displacement they face from their indigenous lands.

Chef Louie's journey is a testament to the power of heritage, family, and resilience. His story is one of cultural preservation, empathy, and using one's platform to make a positive impact on the world.

SUMMER WILSON

Summer Wilson is a graduate of the Bob Cole Conservatory of Music at CSU Long Beach where she earned her bachelor's degree in Music Performance with an emphasis on Flute. She also minored in Native American Cultures. Summer is an active freelance musician and plays with various groups and gives local solo performances. Throughout her musical career, Summer has played various woodwind and low brass instruments with jazz, pop, wind ensembles, and orchestral groups.  When she is not performing, Summer holds a job as a private music instructor as well as a Patient Advocate for those who need help having their voices heard in medical settings.  In her daily life, Summer works to re-establish a connection to her Gabrieleño-Tongva identity through language and music as a member of the Tongva Basketry Collective and The California Flute Duo.

ETHEREAL CORAJE QUINTERO

Ethereal is a climate/ecology educator and environmental organizer based in the San Fernando Valley with experience designing and delivering campaigns that strengthen local climate resilience and collective ownership. Grounded in ecology and people, using a systems approach, Ethereal collaborates with diverse stakeholders to advance equitable access to healthy environments and decision making. Over the last ten years Ethereal has been connecting to our watershed through ecology, our food system, and history. Through campaign stewardship with the Sierra Club Angeles Chapter, Quintero has supported conservation and access efforts at the Ballona Wetlands. They serve as a Board Member for Black Thumb Farm, a youth farming non-profit along the Pacoima Wash. In their independent work at Scorpio Gardens, Ethereal leads community hikes and ecology programming. While Ethereal doesn't have direct Indigenous familial ties, their ancestry from Hidalgo, Mexico has passed on many land based practices.

You can learn more about Ethereal's work on Instagram @scorpiogardens