Native Treasures Living Treasure Ceremony and Night Market, featuring 2022 Living Treasure Virgil Ortiz (Chochiti), Santa Fe Community Convention Center

NATIVE TREASURES LIVING TREASURE

The Museum of Indian Arts and Culture (MIAC) is pleased to announce Virgil Ortiz (Cochiti Pueblo) as the 2022 recipient of the MIAC Living Treasure award. This award is part of the annual Native Treasures Art Market and honors Native American artists who have made outstanding artistic contributions to the field of Indigenous arts and culture. 

Virgil Ortiz’s artistic contributions combine art, décor, fashion, video, and film. One of the most innovative potters of his time, Ortiz’s exquisite works have been exhibited in museum collections around the world including the Museum of Indian Arts and Culture. 

Ortiz, the youngest of six children, grew up in a creative environment in which storytelling, collecting clay, gathering wild plants, and producing figurative pottery was part of everyday life. His grandmother Laurencita Herrera and his mother, Seferina Ortiz, were both renowned Pueblo potters and part of an ongoing matrilineal heritage. “I didn’t even know it was art that was being produced while I was growing up,” he remembers.  

Ortiz keeps Cochiti pottery traditions alive but transforms them into a contemporary vision that embraces his Pueblo history and culture and merges it with apocalyptic themes, science fiction, and his own storytelling. 

“It is vital that our traditional methods and materials are not forgotten but carried forward,” said Virgil Ortiz. “Art is as essential as our Pueblo language and way of life. It creates the connection to the next generation to advance into the future while utilizing relevant, engaging storytelling and modern, high-tech devices and platforms. This means formulating ideas that awaken the imagination and provoke fascination, emotion, and empowerment.” 

Santa Fe Community Convention Center

201 W. Marcy St.

Santa Fe, NM 87501

https://www.museumfoundation.org/native-treasures/