Dedicated to connecting the nature, art and culture of the region, Tohono Chul’s Permanent Collection consists of more than 350 art objects and artifacts that represent both artists and cultures who are successfully making these connections within their work. The Collection Spotlight is a quarterly exhibit series focussing on one or more of these pieces in the Park’s Welcome Gallery.

Current Collection Spotlight:

Space Form
by ANTHONY MELENDY

copper | Gift of William and Susan Small | 95.1.3
April 26 – September 1, 2013

The Collection Spotlight gives us the opportunity to share our diverse Permanent Collection with visitors from around the globe. This quarter, Tohono Chul celebrates the life and work of artist Anthony Melendy through his striking copper sculpture, Space Form. A recipient of the Frank Lloyd Wright Memorial Award in 1965, Melendy created artworks that offered new perspectives on traditional materials. In this wall-hung sculpture, the undulating copper limbs mimic the buoyancy of floating seaweed as it reaches towards the ocean’s surface, offering us a unique glimpse of the many forms of copper.

Past Collection Spotlights:

January 24 – April 21, 2013
Tsitoto Tobacco Flower Katsina by GERRY QUOTSKUYVA | cottonwood root, acrylic paint | Gift of Gerry Quotskuyva | 2008.3.1

October 25 – January 20, 2013
Coiled Pictorial Navajo Basket by PEGGY BLACK | warp: sumac branches; weft: sumac fibers | Gift of Sharon and Larry Malcolmson | 2011.1.1

July 26 – October 21
Olla with Pueblo motif by NOREEN SIMPLICIO | polychrome ceramic | Gift of Richard and Jean Wilson | 1989.1.1

April 26 – July 22
Ganado Rug by CLARA TONEY | wool, analine dyes, natural fibers | Gift of Sharon and Larry Malcolmson | 2011.1.2

January 26 – April 22, 2012
Petrified Wood & Copper Ore | 2007.4.1-3, 2002.1, 2010.1.1

October 2010
Arizona Dawn”By Mary-Russell Ferrell Colton (1889–1971) | oil on canvas | Dimensions: H: 50” W:40” | Loan from Richard and Jean Wilson L88.1.1

August/September 2010
A Desert at Night by Michael Chiago | Tohono O’odham (1946) | Gouache on illustration board

May 2010
Pueblo Friendship pot and Pueblo Friendship kiva by Helen Sando-Garcia | Jemez

June / July 2010
Original bird tiles by Lois McLane

April 2010
Tohono O’odham family outside their brush home, by Chepa and Thomas Franco, Tohono O’odham 2008.6.1

March 2010
Necklace with squash blossom design, by unknown Navajo artist, 2009.3.1

February 2010
Tray with dog and star design, by unknown Yavapai artist

January 2010
Eototo Katsina, by Jimmy Kewanwytewa, Hopi

December 2009
Friendship Pot, by Angea Family, Tohono O’odham, 2005.4.1

November 2009
Navajo Cradleboard, 2009.4.1