January 15, 2022
This panel showcased museums whose focus is on indigenous textiles and the communities who produce them. The presenters, including weavers, writers, and curators, represent a diverse range of backgrounds.
Velma Kee Craig (Diné) is Naasht’eezhi Tabaha (Zuni Edgewater) and born for Todich’ii’nii (Bitter Water). Velma is Assistant Curator at the Heard Museum in Phoenix, Arizona.
Lily Hope was born and raised in Juneau, Alaska to full-time artists. She is Tlingit Indian, of the Raven moiety. Lily co-curated the Portland Art Museum’s exhibition Interwoven Radiance, and served as local weaver consultant for Alaska State Museum’s exhibition Spirit Wraps Around You.
Porfirio Gutierrez is a California-based textile artist, born and raised in the richly historic Zapotec textile community of Teotitlán del Valle in Oaxaca, Mexico. Porfirio co-curated the exhibit Wrapped in Color: Legacies of the Mexican Sarape.
Diane Dittemore has been an ethnological collections curator at the Arizona State Museum for over 40 years, and was a contributing curator for the exhibit, Wrapped in Color.
Photo: Lily Hope, Chilkat Weaver