Special Denver Arts Week Artist Talk and Tour with Melanie Yazzie

Join Shanna Shelby, curator of exhibitions for Denver Arts & Venues, and printmaker, painter and sculptor, Melanie Yazzie for a virtual discussion about "Nizhóní Way" on display at McNichols Civic Center Building Sept. 9-Dec. 18, 2022.

You may join us on Zoom for the virtual tour, or join us in person at McNichols Civic Center Building (144 W. Colfax Ave.).

Melanie will discuss the artworks on display as well as the inspiration for the exhibit.

This special Denver Arts Week event is free and open to the public, but people must register in advance. Be sure to let us know if you will be attending online or in-person when you register. Zoom instructions and a link to join will be emailed to registrants prior to the event. 

For Spanish Translation Services: Brooke.Dilling@denvergov.org
For Sign Language Interpreter or Cart Services: signlanguageservices@denvergov.org
For Other Disability Accommodations: disabilityaccess@denvergov.org

About the Exhibition:

The exhibit title, Nizhóní, means beautiful in Navajo, but it also means living and existing in the world in a beautiful way. Nizhóní touches on being at peace and in balance with your surroundings. In making her work, Melanie Yazzie attempts to bring good to both herself and the viewer. Creating art in this manner is a quiet way to make change. This exhibition is a collection of mixed media works with various levels of printmaking layered with painting and drawing. All the works featured in the exhibition have been created within the last two years. As an artist, Yazzie works to serve as an agent of change by encouraging others to learn about the social, cultural and political phenomena that shape the lives of contemporary Native peoples in the United States and beyond. Her work incorporates personal experiences as well as the events and symbols from Diné culture. This is Yazzie’s first major solo exhibition in the Denver area.

About the Artist:

As a printmaker, painter, and sculptor, Melanie Yazzie’s work draws upon her rich Diné (Navajo) cultural heritage. Her work follows the Diné dictum “walk in beauty” literally, creating beauty and harmony.

Ms. Yazzie uses her travels around the world to connect with other indigenous peoples. Her visits to New Zealand, the Arctic, the Pueblos in the Southwest, and to indigenous peoples of Russia, these travels have been the impetus for continued dialogue about Indigenous cultural practices, language, song, story-telling, and survival.

Ms. Yazzie has exhibited widely, both in the United States and abroad. Her work is in the Museum of Art, Rhode Island School of Design, Print Collection, Providence, the Museum of Contemporary Native Art in Santa Fe, New Mexico, the Kennedy Museum of Art, Art Collection, Ohio University, Athens, Ohio, Rhodes University, Print Collection, Grahamstown, South Africa, to name a few. She has been reviewed in Focus Magazine, Santa Fe, the Los Angeles Times, New Zealand Herald, and she is mentioned in Printmaking in the Sun by Dan Welden and Pauline Muir and The Lure of the Local: Sense of Place in a Multi Centered Society by Lucy Lippard. She has had over 500 group and solo exhibitions combined. Yazzie makes prints, sculptures, paintings, and mixed media works. Her work can always be found at the Glenn Green Gallery in Santa Fe, New Mexico.