At the base of the San Francisco Peaks―an integral part of the Colorado Plateau’s spiritual landscape―MNA’s four festivals highlight the region’s cultures and encourage communication and the exchange of ideas between visitors, educators, and artists. Art, music, performances, and Heritage Insights presentations, together, create cultural understanding and a forum for dialogue.

Immerse your senses in the cultures of the Colorado Plateau. Delight your eyes with a rainbow of dress, dance, and art. Delight your ears with the sounds of ancient drumming and modern Native music. Delight your nose with the scent of baking bread in a traditional Native oven. And most of all, gain a better sense of each featured culture.

MNA festivals offer a balance of ancient and modern cultural presentations, performances, and activities― providing visitors a deeper insight into the Hopi, Navajo, Zuni, and Hispanic cultures living on the Colorado Plateau and in the Four Corners region.  Meet the families who are keeping their Native art forms and customs alive, and learn the cultural significance behind their work.

Artist information and applications
Artist Information is provided here for each festival as it becomes available.  You'll  find entry forms and essential information about participating in the festival listed with the applicable festival.

19th Annual Zuni Festival of Arts and Culture
Member Preview May 22, 2009
Public Festival May 23-24, 2009

In partnership with the A:shiwi A:wan Museum and Heritage Center, a celebration of the Zuni way of life and Zuni expressions of creativity returns after a four year hiatus. The A:shiwi people will share Zuni language, lifeways, and traditional dances and flute playing. Prepare to be amazed and inspired by weavers, inlay jewelers, fetish carvers, and painters. See exotic stone, shell, and antler being carved into Zuni animal fetishes of the six directions. Learn about the shaping, forming, and painting of traditional Zuni pottery.

2009 Zuni Festival Artist Application

MNA’s Hopi festival was started by Museum founders Harold and Mary-Russell Ferrell Colton in an effort to encourage the survival of Hopi arts and crafts. The festival is now a tradition of Hopi families. Many of today’s artisans remember when they were children and assisted their parents at the Hopi festival. Now Hopis of all ages gather at this unique venue, not only to sell their wares, but also to have the chance to get to know the public better. More than 55 booths brim with fine arts and crafts. Visitors gain insight from carvers, painters, jewelers, potters, quilters, and basket and textile weavers against a backdrop of cultural presentations, storytelling, music, and dancing. Take a taste of Hopi bread or piki baked in outside ovens. Watch Hopi pottery being shaped, painted and traditionally fired. Walk the Museum’s Rio de Flag Nature Trail with a Hopi medicine woman. And take part in insightful discussions about the Hopi values of humility, cooperation, respect, balance, and earth stewardship.

The Hopi are descendants of the ancient Puebloan people whose cultural history is documented throughout the Four Corners region for thousands of years. The Hopi villages are located on mesas in northeastern Arizona. Traditionally Hopi are dryland farmers who specialize in the cultivation of corn, beans, and squash. One purpose of Hopi religious ceremonies is to attract rain and snow to the mesas for the benefit of farming and all life forms. Hopi blue corn is adapted to the arid climate and plays an integral part in Hopi ceremonial life.

2009 Hopi Festival Artist Application

A visit to the Navajo Festival is like traveling to the Navajo Nation. An authentic presentation of the Navajo “Beauty Way” philosophy of living in harmony is offered by more than 55 Navajo artists, storytellers, and cultural interpreters from many clans. Witness multi-generations of rug weavers working on traditional upright looms throughout the Museum. Diné Women’s presentation of rug weaving takes the audience on a journey from sheep shearing to weaving techniques and the meanings behind intricate rug designs. Enjoy hoop and traditional dancing, a retrospective fashion show, and ancient and modern Native music. Artists demonstrate jewelry, painting, beading, and pottery techniques. Cultural customs and ways families are using to keep traditions strong are discussed. Explore the tribe’s intricate language with a Navajo linguist and come to understand many ancient legends and traditions. Hike with a Navajo ethnobotanist and learn the Native uses of local plant life.

Navajo legend tells us that the Diné (the people) passed through three worlds before emerging into the present Fourth World or Glittering World. The Holy People placed four sacred mountains in four directions: Mt. Blanca in the East, Mt. Taylor in the South, San Francisco Peaks in the West and Mt. Hesperus in the North, creating the boundaries of Navajoland. Centuries ago, they also taught the Navajo how to live in harmony with Mother Earth and conduct the activities of everyday life. The traditional Navajo lifestyle was pastoral and focused on sheep and goat herding, as well as raising corn.

2009 Navajo Festival Artist Application

The Museum comes to life for Dia de los Muertos or Day of the Dead, an ancient Meso-American holiday held throughout Mexico, Latin America, and the Southwestern United States. Transforming grief into celebration, this ritual pays homage to the lives of lost loved ones by inviting them back to enjoy their favorite music and foods, and to honor their contributions in life. More than a dozen Flagstaff families bring ofrendas (altars), from their homes to share in a courtyard exhibit. Enjoy a special nighttime viewing of the courtyard as the ofrendas are illuminated by candles and luminarias. Learn how Day of the Dead traditions evolved and the meanings behind the objects on the ofrendas. This event is created in partnership with the Flagstaff Hispanic pioneers, Nuestras Raices.

 Celebraciónes de la Gente embraces rich New World customs through musical and theatrical performances such as dazzling Aztec fire dancing, storytelling, mariachis, ballet folklorico, and modern Latin music. Meet a range of creative people from Spanish Colonial artists who create tinwork, straw mosaics, papél picado (paper art), and filigree jewelry to local artists from the Arizona art scene.

MNA's Heritage Program is sponsored by the Arizona Commission on the Arts, the National Endowment for the Arts, Flagstaff Cultural Partners, and the City of Flagstaff.