It is cold and it is dark, but the Winter Solstice brings the promise of light's return and the warming of our world. To celebrate this most important day, we feature a naturally-dyed wool weaving entitled Náhookǫsji Hai (Winter in the North) / Biboon Giiwedinong (It is Winter in the North) held at the Minneapolis Institute of Art (MIA) and produced by Navajo artist D. Y. Begay in 2018. This image, which is only a portion of the slightly larger work, is from our copy of the exhibition catalog Hearts of Our People: Native Women Artists edited by Jill Ahlberg Yohe and Teri Greeves (Kiowa) and published by the MIA in association with the University of Washington Press in 2019.
D.Y. Begay (b. 1953), a Navajo born to the Totsohni’ (Big Water) Clan and born for the Tachinii’ (Red Running into Earth) Clan, is a fourth-generation weaver. Begay’s tapestries encompass her interpretation of the natural beauty and descriptive colors of the Navajo reservation, reflecting on her Navajo identity and her family’s weaving tradition. This spiritual connection to the plants yields the natural colors that are transformed into evocative land formations on her loom. Of the weaving shown here, Jennifer McLerran, curator at the Museum of Northern Arizona and a retired assistant professor of art history at Northern Arizona University, writes:
Most of D. Y. Begay's textiles respond to the Southwest landscape in which she was raised and resides today. For this work, a textile produced with all-natural dyes and handspun wool, Begay traveled to Minnesota in the depths of winter to observe the land surrounding the Grand Portage Indian Reservation of the Ojibwe people. Over an extended period she observed changing light conditions as the sun and clouds moved across the sky, altering the hues of snow and water.
D. Y. Begay with her weaving Confluence of Lavender by Arizona videographer Kelso Meyer, 2016. From the University of Virginia Mellon Indigenous Arts Program.
We wish you a most serene Winter Solstice.
View posts from Winter Solstices past.
View other posts from our Native American Literature Collection.
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