SHONTO BEGAY

Shonto Begay is a Diné (Navajo) artist from Kletha Valley, Arizona. Born one of sixteen children, Begay grew up herding sheep while attending the Bureau of Indian Affairs boarding school on the Navajo reservation. He received his Associate’s of Fine Arts at the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe and his Bachelor’s of Fine Arts from California College of Arts and Crafts. Begay has boundless gratitude towards living in and viewing the vast beauty of the Navajo land – his paintings live as expressions of the Shonto Plateau he calls home. His impressionistic, rhythmic brush strokes are visible in his paintings of desert vistas and colorful skies. He likens his artistic process to a “visual chant,” with each of his strokes being a syllable of a word which contributes to the prayer of the composition.