Revisiting Ours | The Zia Sun

IPCC's Virtual Culture Guide

There is perhaps no more important symbol in New Mexico than the Zia sun. Sixteen rays emanating from a center circle comprise the unmistakable signifier that has come to represent all things New Mexico, displayed everywhere with pride. It’s on the state flag, our license plates, thousands of products and logos, countless tattoos, and draped boldly in red and gold across airliners carrying residents and tourists to and from the Land of Enchantment.

Because it is so closely associated with the state, everybody uses the Zia to say “I’m from New Mexico,” and when you start using a symbol without knowing its original meaning, then what are you actually representing? The exhibit, Ours|The Zia Sun, was a special collaboration between the Indian Pueblo Cultural Center, Zia Pueblo tribal council, and the citizens of New Mexico that showcased what the symbol means to so many New Mexicans, including the Zia Pueblo people who created it.

“The Zia is used to show pride in identity, roots, and place. When I ask people about it they say, ‘I love it,’ and ‘It represents where I’m from,’” says IPCC’s Curator of Exhibitions, Rachel Moore (Hopi), “but if you ask them about its history and original meaning, most people don’t know, or say that it’s simply ‘a Native American symbol.’ We decided that the world needed to know about it, because the Zia sun carries so much pride and meaning for so many of us.”

This important exhibit received more media coverage than any other in IPCC history, with features on local TV news, and in print on local, state, and national levels. Public contributions to the digital portion of the exhibit included 1,227 submissions through our online portal, and another 408 through our Instagram hashtag, #OurZia.

As a result of the exhibit, locals and tourists alike have gained a greater knowledge of, and respect for, the Zia sun symbol, its true and original meaning, and the Zia people who created it. Artists have begun using it more respectfully and less frivolously, and businesses have been wanting to reach out to Zia Pueblo to receive permission to use the symbol, and give back to the pueblo’s educational fund in return.

You can watch our Counter-Narrative panel discussion that inspired the exhibit here. It remains the most-watched of our Counter-Narrative panel discussions, with the number of views climbing every month.

Become a member of IPCC! Enjoy free admission to IPCC exhibits and exclusive previews, dances, and programming, as well as our exclusive member T-shirt, a 10% discount at our museum store, and more.

As Sweet as Mom: Recipes from a Pueblo Kitchen

IPCC's Virtual Culture Guide

Mother’s Day is right around the corner, and just about every mother would appreciate a good dessert. Nicole “Yo” Chino (Santa Ana Pueblo), Sous Chef of our Pueblo Harvest restaurant, shares two of her personal recipes so that you can make things a little sweeter for the mothers in your life. She knows not everyone is a master in the kitchen, and made sure one of the recipes would be easy enough for just about anyone.

Her recipes are below, complete with her notes and introduction.

Yuck Pie

Finished Yuck Pie

First up is an easy, no-bake dessert affectionately known in my household as Yuck Pie. The name comes from a family joke, but I promise you it’s delicious. This pie holds a special place in the Chino home. I only make the pie for my family after our feast day, as a special breakfast treat after all the hard work of putting on a traditional Pueblo feast day.

8 oz. cream cheese (softened)
8 oz. whipped topping
1 ripe banana (maybe 1 ½ bananas depending on size)
21 oz. can pie filling (choose your favorite)
9 oz. ready-made graham cracker crust

You will need a large mixing bowl, beater (whatever you have—hand mixer, standup mixer, or good ol’ elbow grease), spoon or spatula, knife, and a cutting board.


Step one

Mix together cream cheese and whipped topping in a large mixing bowl.

Step two

Peel and slice banana, then layer the graham cracker crust with the sliced banana.

Step three

Evenly spread the cream cheese mixture into the graham crust.

Step four

Open can of pie filling and pour on top of cream cheese mixture.

Step five

Cover pie with a plastic lid and place in the refrigerator for about 30 minutes to set.

Step six

Take that Yuck Pie out, slice, serve, and enjoy!

Apple Cheesecake Pie—Pueblo Style

Finished Apple Cheesecake Pie-Pueblo Style

Second up, for the more ambitious bakers we have Apple Cheesecake Pie—Pueblo style. As most of you know, we Pueblo Natives have so many different celebrations and pay tribute to so many events that involve us eating ALL THE TIME!

This pie was inspired for the simple fact that we also eat on the go, or need food that is going to last and not melt or spoil. It’s always a “hurry up and wait” situation with us, so anything you can eat while walking and carrying items in another hand is a bonus. So, give this pie a try, and always remember to bake with patience and love.

This pie is a pretty simple recipe and can be made two ways. One is in a round 9-inch pie pan with store-bought pie dough, or in a sheet pan with a homemade pie dough.

So here we go…

Ingredients:
2 cans apple pie filling
2 8-oz. packages cream cheese (softened)
½ cup granulated sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 eggs
Pie dough*

*1 cup lard or shortening, ½ cup sugar, 2 eggs, 1 teaspoon vanilla. Mix together. Add 6 cups all purpose flour. Mix and add cold water so your dough is nice and soft but not sticky. Divide in half, wrap in plastic.

Step one

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Spray your pan with non-stick spray, roll out first dough, place in pan making sure there are no bubbles, and lining crust in the edges of the pan.

Beat in eggs, and again scrape the bowl to make sure ingredients are mixed well.

Step two

In a large bowl, beat cream cheese, sugar, and vanilla until nice and smooth. The more your cream cheese is softened the easier it will be to work with. Scrape the bowl to ensure that ingredients are well mixed.

Step Three

Pour mixture into your dough-lined pan and spread evenly. Open your apple filling and spoon onto the top of cheesecake mix.
You want to spoon filling on top, and not just dump it on top. You want to keep two layers to this pie.

Step four

Roll out the second part of the dough and cover the pie. Pinch with your fingers or a fork. Using scissors, snip holes in the top of the pie so that it will breathe.
Beat one egg, wet the top of your pie.
Sprinkle with cinnamon and sugar

Step five

Cover the crust with foil, and place in the oven for 20 minutes. When 20 minutes is up, pull pie out and uncover, and place back into oven for an additional 25 minutes. Allow pie to completely cool, then place in refrigerator to chill and set.

*This pie should be made at least a day in advance of its usage and served cold, ENJOY!

Matriarchs at the Heart of Pueblo Families

IPCC's Virtual Culture Guide

A special blog from our Curator of Exhibitions, Rachel Moore (Hopi).

We are a people who were formed from the clay and emerged from the bosom of Mother Earth. Honoring that creation story, we recognize our origins through our mothers. We each are born into our mother’s clan. Clans are passed from grandmother to mother, to daughter, to granddaughter. They provide us a way to trace our family connections, inheritance rights, and identity gifted to us by our ancestors.

In our way of life, women hold the characteristics of the Earth from which we rely. Women nurture life, and are creators of bodies and homes. Calling the Earth our mother, we show great respect not only for the Earth but also for the women who represent her.

When approaching the subject of Pueblo women, I like to think about their leading Pueblo values—I think of Humility, Love, and Wisdom. Pueblo women are so humble (“She won’t say anything; it is up to us to brag about her,” Stanley Lucero told me when speaking about his wife, Cecelia, for our HERitage exhibit.), yet it is time to acknowledge that our people have had a way of being and acknowledging the power of women long before the current movements.

I say pueblos celebrate matriarchs daily. Our way of introducing ourselves includes being named as a part of our maternal clans, and a lot can be said to dissect and discuss matrilineal and matriarchal societies, which all pueblos are one or both. However, I also consider the woman’s role in mud-plastering the homes, and dividing and processing food for the community, and of course, in carrying forward traditional ways.

Conceptually, Mother’s Day as a way to celebrate our mothers, wives, and other matriarchs is commendable, especially when those roles are often taken for granted in mainstream Western society. However, when we truly consider the breadth of contributions matriarchs make that shape our everyday lives, why not choose the Pueblo way, and incorporate honoring our matriarchs into each and every day?

As I wrap up my thoughts on matriarchs and Mother’s Day, I’d like to leave you with the two quotes below. May they resonate with you as they did with me.

“Mother said ‘[motherhood] takes strength. A different kind of strength [than being a teacher or nun]. But you have someone helping you, and you are in your own pueblo and with your own relatives all the time, and that helps you, too. Every woman has her own strength to do what she needs to do. You have to know what kind of strength you have and how to use it.” – Maria Martinez, renowned San Ildefonso Pueblo potter

“…It was the woman’s part of living to hold things together. Men could build up or tear down houses and ditch banks; but women put clay and sand together to make pottery, or cooked several foods at one time to make one dish. That was part of a woman’s life, to make things whole.” – Alice Marriott, in her book Maria: The Potter of San Ildefonso

Exploring HERitage


HERitage Exhibit at IPCC

The week leading up to Mother’s Day is the perfect time to revisit one of our current rotating exhibits, HERitage: Pueblo Women Paving Cultural Pathways. This remarkable exhibit follows more than a dozen Pueblo women and their accomplishments in their communities, the country, and around the globe.


HERitage highlights historical women who have laid a foundation of culture and community, ending with women today who continue to pave the way forward in our communities and beyond. The women of HERitage are scientists, district court judges, Miss Indian Worlds, educators, architects, traditional and contemporary artists, community leaders, and preservers of languages. In several examples, their accomplishments are shown through three generations.

Pueblo communities exist on the path established by our ancestors. Many of us know elders, women, and girls who are forging new and ever-changing paths to continue our ways of life. Every person holds the capacity to be more, and make a better world around us for future generations. We are a community of people that can make a change. Behind us are our ancestors, holding us up and teaching us what it means to persevere.

HERitage showcases generations of knowledge, inspires women and girls, and creates a real feeling of community. When we reopen, we invite you to learn about the great work begun and continued by many great women coming from our 19 Pueblo communities, and how their work impacts our communities and society today.

HERitage was inspired by the great work of our oral history project, “Journeys and Pathways: Oral Histories of Contemporary Pueblo Women in Service, Leadership, and the Arts.”

Culture, Cartoons, and Catharsis


IPCC's Virtual Culture Guide

There’s an old adage that says laughter is the best medicine. Laughter certainly can be medicinal—making our spirits lighter, and sloughing off some of the weight that accumulates on our proverbial shoulders. Cartoonist Ricardo Caté of Santo Domingo Pueblo has the gift to find the humor in almost any situation.

He is known for Without Reservations, the only Native American cartoon featured in a mainstream daily newspaper, which currently runs in the Santa Fe New Mexican. “The comics are unique perspectives, from not just Native, but the struggling person’s perspective,” Ricardo told IPCC.

Recent cartoon sketch from Ricardo’s Facebook page.
Recent cartoon sketch from Ricardo’s Facebook page.

From history to pipelines to the current toilet paper shortages, Ricardo’s humor can provide a refreshing twist, bringing awareness to real issues while simultaneously providing a much-needed laugh. “Ricardo Caté is truly a treasure – first he makes me laugh, then he makes me think,” says Monique Fragua (Jemez Pueblo), VP of Commercial Enterprises at IPCC.

None of This Painting by Ricard Caté
Ricardo Caté cartoon featured in past Art Through Struggle Gallery exhibit.

Ricardo’s work was the focus of one of our rotating exhibits, the Art Through Struggle Gallery. This gallery is found within a section of our permanent exhibit, and is a unique space for artistic dialogue on difficult subjects facing Native communities.

Ricardo is quite the Renaissance man, and his background reads like an epic road movie. He is a cartoonist, activist, stand-up comedian, writer, teacher, Marine Corps. veteran, former college athlete, and tribal official.

You can read more about Ricardo and his work in one of our earlier blogs here.

You can also read a blog featuring our candid interview with Ricardo about his experience at Standing Rock.

Recent cartoon sketch from Ricardo’s Facebook page.

You can support IPCC programming like the Art Through Struggle Gallery by donating to our general fund.





Recommended Reading

IPCC's Virtual Culture Guide

Pueblo Nations: Eight Centuries of Pueblo Indian History by Joe S. Sando is an important selection from our Pueblo Book Club. It is the story of a people who have retained traditions and beliefs since time immemorial, while adapting to the challenges of the modern world. Unlike most books on Native history and culture, this one is written by a Native author, educator, and elder of Jemez Pueblo.

Drawing on both traditional oral history and written records, Sando describes the origin and development of Pueblo civilizations, the Spanish conquest and occupation, the Pueblo Revolt of 1680, and the response of the pueblos to Mexican independence and conquest by the United States.

Sando presents several portraits of notable Pueblo leaders whose contributions have helped shape the history of their people. He looks at internal developments in Pueblo government, and presents a detailed account of the unremitting struggle to retain sovereignty, land, and water rights in the face of powerful outside pressures.

A well-known Pueblo educator, Sando was instrumental in many aspects of IPCC, and has a dedicated section in our permanent exhibit, We Are of This Place. The knowledge he shared in his books is a valuable part of his legacy, and the legacy of Pueblo scholarship. No Southwest or Native library is complete without Pueblo Nations. Get yours today.

Cultivate, Grow, Thrive: Resilience Garden

IPCC Virtual Culture Guide

Earth Day week is the perfect time to talk about the Resilience Garden, our outdoor living exhibit with hands-on learning opportunities. The garden is where we practice traditional Pueblo farming techniques, celebrate renewal, and cultivate heirloom seeds and indigenous crops. From planting season through harvest, our Resilience Garden is home to our monthly Seasons of Growth learning series.

Seasons of Growth is a program where participants can experience hands-on learning guided by IPCC’s Cultural Education staff and expert guests, giving participants a greater understanding and appreciation of history, culture, and the ecology of Pueblo lands.

Participants learn the principles and techniques of Pueblo agriculture, the history of indigenous crops, how to attract pollinators to gardens, practice sustainability, and care for and protect heirloom crops. Numerous activities include waffle garden construction, making seed balls and seed paper, creating dyes from vegetable scraps, making salsa from your garden ingredients, and taking home seeds and starter plants.

Cultivate your knowledge. Grow your skills. Connect with nature.

Space is limited, so reserve your spot in advance by emailing [email protected].

Unpacking reLocated

IPCC Virtual Culture Guide

One of our current rotating exhibits, “reLocated: Urban Migration, Perseverance, and Adaptation,” is an in-depth multimedia, multisensory presentation on a topic that had a huge impact on Pueblo communities, and much of Native America in general. This special exhibit is a collaborative effort between IPCC’s curatorial team and guest curator Dr. Christina M. Castro (Taos and Jemez Pueblos).

The 1930s brought a huge shift in federal policy toward Native Americans. The 1934 Indian Reorganization Act, or the Indian New Deal, provided funding for education and training of Native people to be competitive in the workforce and earn a living wage. It replaced previous policies that had served to weaken tribal sovereignty. For our Pueblo people, and many Native people across the country, this opportunity for education would almost always require us to leave the reservations and tribal communities for work through an emerging program known as “Relocation” or “Employment Assistance.”

To assimilate our people into mainstream American society, the federal government and many religious organizations operated boarding schools. These schools were places where our children were torn from their homes and forced to abandon their language and culture in favor of English and Western values. By 1925, there were 60,889 children placed in these boarding schools.

Once graduated from these boarding schools, young Native adults often experienced the feeling of not belonging in their home communities due to having been gone so long. Being Native American, they often experienced discrimination in mainstream America. Having been removed from their communities and forced to forget their traditions as youth, they lacked a strong connection to their homes. Because of this, many young men were easily recruited into the military and sent off to war, while others signed up for employment assistance programs.

The need for a growing labor force following WWII led Native Americans into a new era of “urbanization.” Many of our Pueblo people left their homelands for the first time to seek work, and many veterans returning home became frustrated with the limited employment opportunities near home. Some felt no other option than to migrate to urban areas.

Brochures and pamphlets were distributed throughout the pueblos by Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) officials spinning exciting stories of city life. After an initial inquiry about Relocation at a BIA office, or a conversation with a BIA agent, an appointment would be set to review the applicant’s job skills and employment record. Once selected, the BIA official would contact the relocation office in the city of the applicant’s choice.

Depending on the distance, travel to the city would occur by train or bus. Upon arrival to their destination, they were met by a relocation representative who took them to their housing accommodations, usually a low-income apartment in a poor neighborhood. As part of their initial adjustment, relocation officers would often assist the new arrivals with all aspects of adjusting to city life, including where to shop, identifying local schools their children could attend, and also connecting them with nearby churches. Some relocatees were provided with job skills training. In most cases, after the first month, relocatees were on their own.

While some relocatees chose to return home after several years—even decades—of working in cities, there are many who decided to stay and establish lives there. Families grew roots, and now you see third- and fourth-generation descendants of relocatees living and thriving in urban areas. Many Native Americans in cities are members of middle-class America, holding professional positions and college degrees. There are Native lawyers, scholars, engineers, and doctors. With the added mobility of our times, descendants of our pueblos are able to stay connected to their tribal communities, if they have the means and desire.

Pueblo people who live in cities continue to return “home” for holidays, feast days, and other doings. As Pueblo people, we will continue to migrate and adapt to fit our respective needs because it is something we have always done when necessity calls for such measures.

The relocation program is looked back on with mixed feelings. The U.S. government, along with some of the relocated Native populations, maintain that the program was a success. Others feel the program was only successful in disconnecting individuals from their communities and traditions, creating a subgroup that belonged to both worlds, yet to neither.

Do you have a personal or family story about relocation? We’d love to hear from you. Share it on social media with the hashtag #PuebloRelocated, and it may become part of the digital portion of the exhibit. You can learn even more about the Relocation program, plus experience the full multisensory exhibit running into 2021, by visiting IPCC once it reopens.

If you’d like to help support exhibits like this one, please consider making a donation. Every contribution helps us continue our mission to preserve and perpetuate Pueblo culture, and to provide informative, educational, and entertaining programming for you and people from all around the world.

Pueblo Harvest’s Ray of Light

IPCC Virtual Culture Guide

When 2020 rolled in, it brought with it a new executive chef for Pueblo Harvest, the premiere New Mexico venue for Native American cuisine. Located at the Indian Pueblo Cultural Center, Pueblo Harvest is a full-service restaurant which can be considered a culinary extension of the museum, continuing to tell the Pueblo story through the medium of Indigenous and Southwestern ingredients.

Executive Chef Ray Naranjo is of Native American roots from the Ancestral Pueblos of the Southwest and the Three Fires tribes of the Great Lakes. He believes in the preservation of the foodways and ancestral knowledge of his people, and strives to continue on this path. By using both modern and ancestral cooking techniques, he attempts to push the limits of what is known, unknown, and forgotten about the Indigenous food culture of North America.

“My goal for Pueblo Harvest Is to give an experience that mirrors the present-day food culture while being inclusive of Ancestral Puebloan ingredients, and the ingredients that would have been available via trade routes from tribes to the south,” Chef Naranjo says. “I will attempt to blend the past and the present to tell a story that will lead us to the future of Native American food cultures.

Chef Naranjo has a culinary degree and more than 25 years of service in the kitchen industry. He has experience in exclusive hotel and casino resorts in the Southwest, with various titles ranging from Executive Chef to Food & Beverage Director. Chef Naranjo has also been presented with several awards in Modern New Mexican Cuisine, with a focus on the chile of New Mexico. He has cooked for tribal communities, celebrities, and former first ladies, but says it’s not who he cooks for that matters most to him, but how they feel, and the satisfaction they get from the dishes he creates.

Want to learn more about Chef Naranjo? You can read the Albuquerque Journal’s in-depth Q&A interview with him here.

With Pueblo Harvest temporarily closed from the pandemic, Chef Naranjo still wants to cook for you by proxy from his home in Santa Clara Pueblo by sharing one of his easy, go-to personal comfort dishes utilizing ingredients native to New Mexico and the greater Southwest. Try the recipe in your own home, and let us know how well you did.

Buffalo Short Rib Posole with Chimaja & Chile de Árbol

1.5 lbs. buffalo short ribs
1 lb. uncooked posole 1 small onion, medium diced
1 oz. dried chimaja 1 oz. granulated garlic
2 Tbsp. Zuni salt (or 1 Tbsp regular salt)
5 Chile de árbol, whole
2.5 qts. water

Add all ingredients to a crock pot and cook for six hours. Serves up to five people.

IPCC’s Near and Dear Volunteers

IPCC Virtual Culture Guide

April is National Volunteer Month, and IPCC is grateful for the many contributions of our volunteers. They generously share their time, experience, and expertise to help us fulfill our mission of preserving and perpetuating Pueblo culture, collectively averaging well above 3,000 hours per year. Some of our volunteers have been with us for 30 years or more!

Volunteers give tours, help maintain our Library & Archives, staff special events, assist with museum collections management, cultivate the Resilience Garden, and more. We deeply appreciate them for their dedication and commitment. If you’re not already a volunteer, there are opportunities to join our dedicated family of enthusiastic and knowledgeable individuals. Together, our volunteers help make the Center a welcoming and inspiring place to visit.

Being a volunteer at IPCC has many benefits, including unlimited free admission to the museum, exhibits, murals, Native American dances, and public guided tours. Volunteers also receive discounts at Pueblo Harvest and the Indian Pueblo Store, and attend volunteer-exclusive exhibit previews and events, a volunteer recognition event, and annual holiday luncheon.

To join this amazing group and take part in the many benefits volunteering has to offer, visit IndianPueblo.org/support/volunteer

Indigenous Wisdom: Centuries of Pueblo Impact in New Mexico

IPCC Virtual Culture Guide

With so many school closures in effect now, many families and individuals are seeking educational resources. Here’s how we can help—our Indigenous Wisdom K–12 curriculum is FREE for anyone to download, and includes several fun and engaging STEM activities (including cooking).

Indigenous Wisdom has easy-to-follow lesson plans for each grade level in Math, Language Arts, Social Studies, and Science, plus plenty of activities that can be done with common household items. The curriculum is written so that it can easily be implemented by parents, a homeschool family, educators, or community partners. Its simple instructions include step-by-step procedures, website links, book references, and worksheets for a convenient, complete package.

Students can explore and apply the Pythagorean Theorem in context with Pueblo Bonito in Chaco Canyon, study ecology and stewardship through how the actions people take upstream impact the people and communities downstream, learn history and Tewa words simultaneously through storytelling, and create a pair of moccasins and geometrical design using congruency and the line of symmetry, to illustrate a few types of lessons.

We hope you enjoy this fun and educational resource, and invite you to let us know what projects, lessons, and materials you and your family like best.

With so many school closures in effect now, many families and individuals are seeking educational resources. Here’s how we can help—our Indigenous Wisdom K–12 curriculum is FREE for anyone to download, and includes several fun and engaging STEM activities (including cooking).

Indigenous Wisdom has easy-to-follow lesson plans for each grade level in Math, Language Arts, Social Studies, and Science, plus plenty of activities that can be done with common household items. The curriculum is written so that it can easily be implemented by parents, a homeschool family, educators, or community partners. Its simple instructions include step-by-step procedures, website links, book references, and worksheets for a convenient, complete package.

Students can explore and apply the Pythagorean Theorem in context with Pueblo Bonito in Chaco Canyon, study ecology and stewardship through how the actions people take upstream impact the people and communities downstream, learn history and Tewa words simultaneously through storytelling, and create a pair of moccasins and geometrical design using congruency and the line of symmetry, to illustrate a few types of lessons.

We hope you enjoy this fun and educational resource, and invite you to let us know what projects, lessons, and materials you and your family like best.

Download free curriculum, a terrific, at-home educational resource

Artists Circle Gallery: Amanda Beardsley’s “Pueblo Pop” 

Pueblo Pop by Amanda Beardsley (Laguna Pueblo, Hopi, Choctaw) is currently on display in our Artists Circle Gallery. Amanda’s artwork combines traditional Native American themes with contemporary objects, and speaks to a wide audience. Some of her artwork contrasts traditional settings with modern objects that accompany our lives and emphasize our traditional values and the acceptance of change.

Amanda incorporates different mediums to manipulate the emotions of the viewers, such as pop culture images, graffiti media, historical photographs, graphics, motifs, animation, and foreign paper. When these mediums are used, they form a story that connects our people with a contemporary reality.

Amanda’s work is influenced by Indigenous history, reading books, watching cable as a kid, Native American artists, childhood memories, graffiti, her Instagram account, and everything Hello Kitty. She is inspired both by contemporary art as well as traditional art, combining both categories to depict new ideas.

While growing up, Amanda watched several family members create works of art. Both her aunt and uncle are jewelers, her cousin carves stone, and her mother makes pottery and beadwork. Artwork hangs on every wall throughout her grandparents’ home, and she remembers going from room to room sketching and admiring the works of T.C. Cannon, Helen Hardin, Virginia Stroud, Vincent Van Gogh, and many more.

Amanda hopes to educate people through her artwork by enlarging their understanding of the history of Indigenous peoples. She would like to teach art to children someday, and to different Indigenous communities. She was one of three students from the Institute of American Indian Arts (IAIA) to be selected as a Society for Incentive Travel Excellence (SITE) Scholar and participate in a SITE Santa Fe exhibition.

While attending IAIA, Amanda studied studio arts, and took several courses that helped further her artistic designs, including European Art History, Indigenous Studies, and Southwestern Pueblo Architecture to name a few.

By having a diverse background, Amanda is able to use her cultures, influences, and inspirations to blend together and reveal a whimsical reality. She is grateful for these early influences that guided her youthful endeavors as an artist.

Help support IPCC programs like the Artists Circle Gallery DONATE TODAY