Events

Salt River Pima-Maricopa Indian Community member August Wood is a local traditional artist who creates baskets and clay pots. He is returning to the Deer Valley Petroglyph Preserve to demonstrate traditional clay pottery making. Learn from August the traditional techniques used in making clay pottery by utilizing natural materials commonly used by the Akimel O'odham.

Learn More About August Wood

Learn how traditional O'Otham baskets are made from Josh Yazzie! Joshua Yazzie is an enrolled member of the Gila River Indian Community (District 5 VahKi) and also plays a key role at the Huhugam Heritage Center, where he curates collections. He has initiated the Akimel O’Otham Weavers Circle to unite fellow O’otham members in celebrating and preserving this cherished tradition.

Ipa Dutchover will be demonstrating the art of seashell etching! Ipa Dutchover works as the Native Language Culture Coordinator for Salt River Schools, teaching about the O'odham language and culture! 

Jerilynn Yazzie is a Diné (Navajo) artist who specializes in creating jewelry using shells, turquoise, unique gemstones, precious metals, juniper berry seeds, and vintage coins. She was taught by her family, community, and through school.

Her jewelry business is Shiyoo Designs and you can find a few of her pieces for sale in our store! Through each piece Jeri creates, she awakens Indigenous pride and Indigenous fashion. Stop by her booth to check out some of her incredible jewelry!

Shiyoo Designs Etsy

Founded in 2006 by Quechan/Hopi artist and toymaker Gregory Hill, Hilltops Spinning Wonders creates handcrafted spinning tops that blend art, play, and education. Gregory Hill’s daughter, Leticia Hill, also helps make the spinning tops as a talented toymaker.

Each Hilltops Spinning Wonders top is handmade from start to finish using non-toxic materials safe for all ages. Crafted from responsibly gathered cottonwood driftwood and shaped with hand tools, every top is wood-burned and hand-painted with non-toxic watercolors that soak naturally into the wood. Optional handmade beeswax and mineral oil sealants help preserve the color and finish.

TATÉ WALKER (they/them) is a Lakota citizen of the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe of South Dakota. They are an award-winning Two Spirit storyteller. Their first full-length poetry book, The Trickster Riots, was published in 2022, by Abalone Mountain Press.

​Taté, a 2022 Pushcart Prize nominee, has written, photographed, and/or edited for various outlets, including The Nation, Yellow Medicine Review, Little Somethings Press, Studies in American Indian Literature, Pipe Wrench, Apartment Therapy, Everyday Feminism, Native Peoples, Indian Country Today, Subaru Drive, and December. They are also featured in several anthologies: FIERCE: Essays by and about Dauntless Women, South Dakota in Poems, W.W. Norton's Everyone's an Author, and Good Eats: 32 Writers on Eating Ethically. Their most recent book, Indigenous Voices, is an inspiring volume of quotations by Indigenous thought leaders, activists, politicians, and scholars illustrated with stunning artwork by Indigenous artists.

Taté is a co-founder of the Phoenix Two Spirit Community group, which helps organize the annual Arizona Two Spirit Powwow and Rainbow Gathering. They are also a longtime member of—and also serve on the board of directors for—the Oceti Sakowin Writers Society, which has a mission to mentor, empower, and promote Lakota, Dakota, and Nakota literary traditions. Taté is a 2023 ASU Poetry & the Senses Fellow and the 2023 Storyknife Fireweed Fellow. Taté has 20 years of experience in print/digital journalism and advocacy writing, and is a trusted community builder within/for social justice and tribal education spaces.

AYLING ZULEMA DOMINGUEZ (they/she) is a poet, mixed media artist, and youth arts educator with roots in Puebla, México (Nahua) and República Dominicana. Grounded in a poetics of anti-colonialism, their art and writing ask who we are at our most free, and explore the subversions and imaginings needed in order to arrive there. Their collages juxtapose images of the body with that of structural injustice to prompt critical interrogation of our current systems of punishment disguised as justice.

Ancestral veneration, Indigenous Futurisms, and communing with the archive are major themes in Ayling’s writing. What can language do for our rebellions and resistance efforts? How can we use it to birth new worlds and weave our ancestors into the fabric of them? What to do with all this rage and sorrow and joy, all this inheritance?

Ayling’s writing has recently been supported by Tin House, We Need Diverse Books, and the Virginia G. Piper Center for Creative Writing. Ayling continues to nurture creative expression among community by hosting free monthly writing workshops online, installing interactive public artworks, and hyping up fellow poets and artists at local open mic joints. Ultimately, they believe in poetry as a tool for liberation.

RUBEN CU:K BA'AK (he/him) is an enrolled member of the Tohono O’odham Nation. He is a traditional O’odham that continues to learn about his O’odham Himdag, through language, philosophies, and songs from his Elders and mentors. Ruben is the Community Engagement Specialist for the Tsosie Lab For Indigenous Genomic Equity & Justice based at Arizona State University. He is currently working on an Ph.D. in Anthropology in the School of Human Evolution and Social Change. Ruben is in recovery and helps people in recovery in their battle with addiction, alcoholism, and violence. He also reads and writes poetry, his poetry is his reflection of growing up on the Rez, living through institutions/systems, recovery, and his message is of healing and perseverance.