Amerind Free Online Talk: Navajo Traditional Stories and the Science of Geology with Henry Haven

Yaalnii Neé Yani (Navajo Creator) blowing air into the small earth: image by Henry Haven
photo: Spider Rock in Canyon de Chelly

Amerind Free Online Talk

Saturday, February 15, 2025

11:00 am (AZ time)

Navajo Traditional Stories and the Science of Geology, with Henry Haven 

To register, visit: https://bit.ly/Amerindonline02152025Haven

Join us on Saturday, February 15, 2025 at 11:00 am (AZ time) for an online talk with Geologist Henry Haven (Diné).

Henry will be giving a talk on his knowledge of traditional Navajo stories and oral history and the connection to the history and science of geology. Henry compares the four geological eras and geological events in the Four Corners region and lands of the (Diné Biknéyah) to traditional oral stories of the four worlds, four sacred elements, and other cultural concepts, where appropriate. They are not based on science as we know it but reflect an awareness of past geological events. Henry also draws on his education and experience as a geologist. This talk is based on his book entitled “Navajo Traditional Stories and the Science of Geology”, which he co-authored with J. Dale Nations, PhD, Geologist, and Max Goldtooth, Sr., a Navajo Medicine Man. (Innovative Ink Publishing, 2023).

Henry Haven is a geologist from the Navajo Nation. He received his master’s in Geology from Northern Arizona University. He retired after many years from the Navajo Nation Environmental Protection Agency. Previously, he worked for the Oil and Gas industry in Texas and the Four Corners area, exploring for oil and gas. Henry continues to consult for the Navajo Nation EPA, helping value and care for the land and water.

If you are unsure if you will be able to watch live at 11 on February 15th, register with an email, and you will be sent the recording of the talk after the talk.

Tucson Symphony event with Raven Chacon

Join us for an Amerind in Tucson event with the Tucson Symphony

Friday, February 21, 2025, 7:30 pm

Sunday, February 23, 2025, 2:00 pm with preconcert talk at 1:00pm

at Linda Ronstadt Music Hall: 260 S. Church Ave. Tucson, AZ. (NW corner of city block, next to Convention Center parking garage)

Tickets:  $14-$95 available through the Tucson Symphony 

Dvořák and the American Experience

with Ravon Chacon: Inscription

a TSO Co- Commission

Paul Huang, who left TSO audiences spellbound in 2022, returns to perform Dvořák’s Violin Concerto, originally written for the composer’s friend, violinist Joseph Joachim. The concerto is accompanied by two of Dvořák’s Slavonic Dances. Written originally for piano duo while he was still relatively unknown, it was these dances that helped Dvořák achieve notoriety. Dvořák came to the U.S. later in life and wrote the New World Symphony, inspired by African-American spirituals. The concert’s second half features works by American composers with very different backgrounds: a TSO co-commissioned work by Arizona-born Raven Chacon, a 2023 MacArthur Genius Grant awardee, and Still’s Symphony No. 1, known as the “Afro-American.” Chacon, a member of the Navajo Nation, draws on relationships between the western and indigenous communities while Still drew from popular African-American music.

Raven Chacon has mentored over 300 high school Native Composers as part of the annual Grand Canyon Music Festival. He also won the 2022 Pulitzer Prize for Music for “Voiceless Mass”.

William Grant Still was the first African American to have his symphony performed by a major orchestra. His daughter, Judith, lives in Flagstaff, Arizona.

Featured Performers
Program
  • Antonín Dvořák: Slavonic Dance, Op. 72, No. 2
  • Dvořák: Slavonic Dance, Op. 46, No. 8
  • Dvořák: Violin Concerto
  • Raven Chacon: Inscription TSO Co-Commission
  • William Grant Still: Symphony No. 1, “Afro-American”

Please note:

  • This concert is available as part of a Classic Series or Create Your Own Subscription.
  • Linda Ronstadt Music Hall has a clear bag policy. Read more about this venue
  • The Friday concert only will be presented in the Classics With a Twist format: there will be on-stage introductions to the music and your chance to ask questions of the artists in a post-concert Q&A.
  • Friday’s concert is expected to last approximately 2 hours, including intermission.
  • The Sunday concert only will be preceded by Concert Comments,a pre-concert talk, beginning at 1:00 p.m.

This concert and the Raven Chacon project is underwritten by Shirley Chann with additional support from Linda Staubitz and the Amerind Foundation.

Poetry Reading with Kimberly Blaeser

Join the Amerind in Tucson

Thursday, January 30, 2025, 7:00 pm

Tom Sanders Memorial Reading: Kimberly Blaeser (White Earth Nation)

at the University of Arizona Poetry Center

1508 E. Helen St., Tucson, AZ 85719

Cost: Free

Amerind is proud to be one of the sponsors of this event.

The Tom Sanders Memorial Reading is an annual presentation in the Poetry Center’s Reading and Lecture series. Established by the generosity of Tom’s friends in 2017, this event features writers who were former students at the University of Arizona, writers who were formerly or currently members of the University of Arizona faculty, writers with strong ties to Southern Arizona, or University of Arizona Press authors. This year, The Poetry Center is proud to present Kimberly Blaeser.

Kimberly Blaeser, poet, photographer, and scholar, is past Wisconsin Poet Laureate and founding director of Indigenous Nations Poets. She is the author of six poetry collections including Ancient Light, Copper Yearning, and Résister en dansant/Ikwe-niimi: Dancing Resistance. Her photographs and picto-poems have appeared in exhibits such as “Visualizing Sovereignty,” and “No More Stolen Sisters.”

An enrolled member of White Earth Nation, Blaeser is an Anishinaabe activist and environmentalist whose accolades include a Lifetime Achievement Award from Native Writers’ Circle of the Americas. Blaeser is an MFA faculty member at Institute of American Indian Arts and Professor Emerita at University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee.

In addition to the in-person reading, most Reading & Lecture Series events are streamed live on the poetry center’s website.

 

Mata Ortiz Show & Sale

Mata Ortiz Show & Sale

Friday, February 14, 2025 – Sunday, February 16, 2025

10 am – 4 pm each day

Featuring award-winning artists Laura Bugarini, Hector Gallegos Jr., and Ramiro Veloz

Come out to Amerind’s Mata Ortiz Show and Sale and meet Award-winning artists and potters Hector Gallegos Jr., Laura Bugarini, and Ramiro Veloz from Mata Ortiz, Chihuahua, Mexico. Talk with this husband-and-wife team (Hector and Laura) and learn about their work and collaborations. Also, meet Ramiro Veloz and see all the incredible work that these artists have created. The artists will conduct demonstrations and pottery firings (weather permitting). You will have the opportunity watch the creation and to add a unique piece to your collection.

Also, on Friday, February 14, from 10 am-4 pm and Saturday from 10 am-3 pm, we will have a book signing with Award-Winning Author Charmayne Samuelson for her new book, Mata Ortiz Poetry of the Clay. This full-color, bilingual book features 24 contemporary potters and original poetry by Charmayne Samuelson.
She will also have her best-selling biography, SPENCER MacCALLUM Memories-Mystique-Mata Ortiz, a biography of the anthropologist who jump-started the Mata Ortiz pottery movement after meeting potter, farmer, and cowboy Juan Quezada.

This event is included with regular Museum admission.

Texas Canyon Mountain Bike Race & Fun Ride-April 26, 2025

Texas Canyon Mountain Bike Race & Fun Ride

Saturday, April 26, 2025

7:30 am start time for the 15.8-mile course

7:40 am start time for the 7.9-mile course

7:45 am start time for 7.9-mile non-competitive Fun Ride

To register, visit:  https://bit.ly/TCMBR25

The Amerind presents the 6th Annual Texas Canyon Mountain Bike Race on Saturday, April 26, 2025.

Join us for this popular race and experience mountain biking at its best on a course that takes you on one or two 7.9 mile loops through the spectacular Texas Canyon Nature Preserve which is normally closed to bikes.

Open to ages 12-99, participants can select from three event options, including a non-competitive Fun Ride with E-bikes welcome. In addition to their medals, the overall winners of the 15.8 and the 7.9-mile race will receive a beautiful piece of Native American art. Awards are not given in the non-competitive Fun Ride division.

Shirts commemorating your ride can be purchased during the registration process for $24. Commemorative finishers medals will be given to the first 200 participants. After the awards ceremony, grab a bite—we will have food trucks—Your registration includes free entry into the Amerind Museum and Galleries. Simply show your bike plate number or free passes to the admissions desk to take advantage of this offer.

Make it a day! The Amerind always welcomes the public to come out and cheer on the riders and join in on the fun!

Race Divisions

Jr Male/Female 12-19

Male/Female 20-59

Male/Female 60+

Do you want to register as a corporate or other large group? Don’t hesitate to contact us for details; we make it easy!

Participation in the event enables Amerind to further its mission of fostering and promoting knowledge and understanding of the Native Peoples of the Americas through research, education, conservation, and community engagement.

Register here: https://bit.ly/TCMBR25

We hope to see you on Saturday, April 26th!

Vintage Basketry and Weavings with Terry DeWald

Vintage Basketry and Navajo Weavings show with Terry DeWald

Saturday, January 25, 2025

10:00 am – 4:00 pm

Talk at 1:00 pm

Please join us on Saturday, January 25, 2025, when we host Terry DeWald for a Vintage Basketry and Navajo Weavings Show at the Amerind Museum. The show will feature vintage Navajo weavings and baskets from California, the greater Southwest, and contemporary Tohono O’odham baskets.

DeWald has been a prominent dealer, lecturer, appraiser, and author of Native American art for more than 40 years.

Come and learn all about this beautiful art, have questions? Terry’s the one to ask! Also, remember that you do not pay sales tax on purchases from the Amerind Museum. Your purchases directly support Amerind’s work with Indigenous artists, museum collections, and public programming.

Terry will give a talk at 1:00 PM

This event is included with regular Museum admission.

Mata Ortiz Pottery Show & Sale

Mata Ortiz Pottery Show & Sale

Friday – Sunday

November 29 – December 1, 2024

10 am – 4 pm

Please join us Thanksgiving weekend for a show and Sale of Mata Ortiz Pottery featuring Master potter Oralia Lopez who will be demonstrating her work. Oralia is a second-generation potter from Mata Ortiz who is known for her flawless intricate painted geometric designs.  Oralia will also be bringing a collection of ceramics from other select potters living and working in Mata Ortiz.

Also, on Friday from 11 am-4 pm and Saturday 10 am-3 pm, we will have a book signing with Award-Winning Author Charmayne Samuelson for her new Mata Ortiz book, “POETRY OF THE CLAY, POESÍA DEL BARRO” is a bilingual, full-color photo book featuring 24 Mata Ortiz potters and enhanced by poetry by author, Charmayne Samuelson. Hard-backed case laminate, glossy paper, with full-page layouts of the potters and pottery.

She will also be signing her best-selling biography of Spencer MacCallum.

This event is included with Museum admission.

Book-Signing and Talk with Authors Henry Haven, Dale Nations, PhD and, Max Goldtooth, Sr.

Saturday, November 23, 2024

11 am – 12 pm

Join us for a book signing with authors Heny Haven and Dale Nations, PhD & Max Goldtooth, Sr., who will be signing their book “Navajo Traditional Stories and the Science of Geology” by Dale Nations, Henry Haven & Max Goldsmith, Sr.

Geologist Henry Haven (Dine’) will also give a talk.

The three authors of this book vary greatly in backgrounds and experience but share in the love of the land and a desire to impart their knowledge of it. Comparisons are made of the rock record of geologic events known to geologists, to the legends in stories known to traditional Navajos. Ages and environments of deposition of stratigraphic units progress from the two billion-year-old rocks that are exposed in the Inner Gorge of the Grand Canyon to succeeding rock units known to exist on and under the lands of Dine ‘Bikeyah across the Colorado Plateau that were formed a few million years ago or less. Geologists use observed fossil records and other geologic events to establish a Universal Geologic Time Scale that consists of four Eras of geologic time: the Precambrian, Paleozoic, Mesozoic, and Cenozoic eras. Navajo medicine men tell stories of their vision of the First Dark World, the Second Blue World, the Yellow Third World, and the Fourth White World. The stories show a major cycle of life beginning and extinction of variety of different species in the four worlds as does the geologic history in the four geologic eras.

*This event is included with Museum admission

The Power of Pastel- Exhibit Celebration & Plein Air Paint Out

Saturday, October 5th

9 a.m. to 12 p.m. Plein Air Paint Out

1-2 p.m. Exhibit Celebration

Come and join us on Saturday, October 5th, from 1-2 pm as we celebrate the exhibit The Power of Pastel. This juried show of Tucson Pastel Society artists is a snapshot of the region’s many talented pastel artists, the uniqueness of each artist, and the many styles in which they paint. Come and enjoy the art and meet the artists as we celebrate this show.

This exhibit runs through November 30, 2024.

The Tucson Pastel Society will also be having a Plein Air Paint Out on the Amerind grounds from 9-12. You are invited to bring your paints or pastels and join them in this Plein Air Paint Out. All mediums are welcome. The artists also enjoy visiting with the public as they paint. Come out and paint or just observe a painting in progress before the celebration.

For more information, visit their website: Tucson Pastel Society.

This event is included with Museum admission.

* Please note: If you want to plein air paint beyond the picnic area or Yucca Park by hiking out onto the trails, you must check in with the admissions desk before going out. Thank you.