Virgil Ortiz (Cochiti Pueblo), Rezzurect: Wildflower Tendrils, 2013, acrylic paint, Converse Chuck Taylor High Top All Star sneakers. Gift of Charles King, 5023-2A, B. Photograph by Craig Smith, Heard Museum.
For example, Cochiti Pueblo artist Virgil Ortiz is best known as a potter and fashion designer. “Clay is the heart and soul of everything I create, but I love to venture outside the box and utilize any medium I can get my hands on,” says Ortiz. “I sketch, paint, or sculpt onto different objects. This helps me in my design development process, which involves applying 2D art to 3D sculptures.” The design on his Converse high-tops was inspired by wildflower tendrils and will be shown in conjunction with his figurative clay sculpture.
Jennifer Tafoya (Santa Clara Pueblo), Untitled, paint, shoes. Gift of Charles King. Photograph by Craig Smith, Heard Museum.
When gallerist Charles King—who gifted the Heard many of the shoes in the exhibit—asked Jennifer Tafoyoa, a Santa Clara Pueblo potter, to paint something on a pair of sneakers she settled on a dragon. “I did an Avanyu (a water serpent and Tewa deity) in the style of an Asian anime dragon,” she explains. “It combines both worlds of what I’m interested in—anime and traditional figures, and it was fun to try to combine the two. I find it fascinating that both the water serpent and the dragon both represent the same thing in both cultures.”
Tammy Garcia (Santa Clara Pueblo) works in many mediums and liked the idea of creating a design without the restrictions of clay, metal or glass. She created a bold black design inspired by Asian tattoo art using dots of ink to create shadow and texture.
Tammy Garcia (Santa Clara Pueblo), Spring Time Converse, 2016, fabric marker, shoes. Gift of Charles King. Photograph by Craig Smith, Heard Museum.
Getting creative with footwear is nothing new to beadwork artist Teri Greeves, whose fully-beaded We Gave Two Horses In Honor Of Our Son will be on display. “Through the ages Kiowa people have almost always adorned their footwear,” she says. “Making beaded tennis shoes is simply a continuance of something started long before me: the idea that personal adornment can be an expression of self, of society, of tribe and of humanity.”
Jennifer Tafoya (Santa Clara Pueblo), Untitled, paint, shoes. Gift of Charles King. Photograph by Craig Smith, Heard Museum.
Greeves understands the surface appeal of the beaded tennis shoes—they are fun, whimsical and familiar—but her intention is to also tell a more complex story of contemporary Indian life with her beaded illustrations. “In some way then the viewer becomes educated, even if only subconsciously, to the fact that we, as Native people, exist in the here and now and not as caricatures and stereotypes, but as real and multifaceted human beings.”
May 3, 2024-January 5, 2025
Art & Sole
Heard Museum, 2301 N. Central Avenue, Phoenix, AZ 85004
(602) 252-8840, www.heard.org
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