There’s a lot more to a Navajo weaving than the finished piece hanging on a gallery wall. This September, Western Spirit: Scottsdale’s Museum of the West is inviting visitors to look a little closer with the opening of Woven: Navajo Textiles from the Pelberg Collection, a new exhibition exploring the artistry and process behind contemporary Navajo weaving.
The exhibition features seven modern works by Diné (Navajo) artists representing a range of styles. While the finished textiles showcase striking colors, patterns, materials and designs, Woven encourages visitors to think about the generations of knowledge, and the individual decisions, that went into creating them.
As Chief Curator Dr. Andrew Patrick Nelson explains, the exhibit focuses on the parts of the process that aren’t necessarily visible in the final work: “A weaving begins with a decision and is followed by dozens more. By the time you see the finished piece, none of that work is visible. We wanted to make that process, that history, visible.”
Visitors can follow wool from sheep to finished textile through interpretive displays and three hands-on experiences featuring raw wool, dyed skeins and a woven sampler. Immersive window images of a Diné weaver at the loom further connect the finished works with the people, places, materials and knowledge behind them.
To celebrate the exhibition’s opening, Western Spirit is offering free admission to children 17 and under on September 5 and 6. Families can explore the exhibit together and participate in hands-on activities, including a take-home project that lets kids create their own woven masterpiece. A dedicated children’s area will also feature books and playful seating.
The works in the exhibition come from the Art and Linda Pelberg Family Collection of Native American Art, which was collected over nearly five decades and donated to Western Spirit in 2022. The collection is considered one of the world’s significant private assemblages of modern and contemporary textiles, carvings and pottery from the Southwest. Assistant Curator Natalie Reichert, lead curator of Woven, hopes visitors leave with a deeper appreciation for Navajo weaving as a living art form.
“These incredible weavings have been sustained through generations of knowledge but are also consistently renewed through the weaver’s own personal choices,” Reichert says. “The foundation of the art form has remained unchanged, yet the implementation of artistry makes Navajo weaving truly limitless.”
For families looking for a meaningful Labor Day weekend outing, it’s a pretty perfect opportunity to experience art – and let the kids get their hands on it, too. For more: Western Spirit Museum.
