Linda Lomahaftewa: An Overnight Success, Sixty Years in the Making
On a recent trip to New York, I visited the Whitney Museum of American Art where I was able to see Sixties Surrealism, a show featuring work from the 1960s that reflects a Surreal style including work by Linda Lomahaftewa (Hopi/Choctaw, b. 1947). For the curators, the show highlights how artists “chaotic id of the decade” in terms of content and style. In the company of artists including Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein, Robert Rauschenberg, Sol LeWitt, and Jasper Johns, Linda’s bright painting Untitled Woman's Faces from the 1960s reminds visitors that Native artists, including Lomahaftewa, Fritz Scholder, and Oscar Howe, played an important role as emblems of identity and self-determination, especially as a way to see history from different perspectives. Lomahaftewa’s piece melds women’s faces into an open landscape, suggesting the connection between the figures and terrain.
Today, Lomahaftewa is enjoying a remarkable moment in the spotlight. In 2025 alone, her work is included in several major exhibitions, including at the Fresno Art Museum in California, the Zimmerli Art Museum in New Jersey, the Nelimarkka Museum in Finland, and the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Arkansas. Museums, collectors, and critics are recognizing what Native communities, students, and fellow artists have long known: Linda Lomahaftewa is a legend.
The term “Overnight success” usually refers to someone who bursts suddenly onto the cultural stage, seemingly out of nowhere, but with very few exceptions, overnight successes have spent decades studying their craft, refining their vision, quietly building their reputations before the wider world finally catches up. That is Lomahaftewa’s story -- a painter, printmaker, and educator whose career spans more than six decades and who influenced on contemporary Native art for decades.
This so-called “overnight success” was sixty years in the making.
A Life in Art: From IAIA to San Francisco
Born in Phoenix, Arizona, Lomahaftewa joined the inaugural class at the Institute of American Indian Arts (IAIA), founded in Santa Fe in 1962 for her associate’s degree. IAIA’s mission was to give Native artists not just training in historic forms but also access to the contemporary art movements shaping the world. As IAIA founder Lloyd Kiva New (Cherokee) famously said, “The future of Indian art lies in the future, not in the past.” Many of the students and instructors in the first IAIA class defined the next generation: T.C. Cannon (Kiowa/Caddo), Kevin Red Star (Crow), Earl Biss (Crow), Allan Houser (Chiricahua Apache), Charles Loloma (Hopi), and Kiva New himself.
From Santa Fe, she went on to earn both her BFA and MFA at the San Francisco Art Institute followed by teaching positions in the area. Her years in the Bay Area (1965–1976) coincided with an extraordinary era of activism and creativity, such as the occupation of Alcatraz Island, the counterculture revolution, and the rise of the Chicano mural movement. Lomahaftewa contributed artwork to American Indian Movement exhibitions and lived at the epicenter of cross-cultural artistic ferment.
While the Bay Area Figurative Movement and Funk Art dominated West Coast studios, Lomahaftewa charted her own path. Her canvases drew deeply from Hopi and Choctaw visual traditions while engaging with abstraction, producing bold, layered compositions of spirals, crosses, corn plants, and spiritual symbols. Even in her early career, she resisted the expectations of “tourist Indian art” and created work that was unapologetically contemporary, unapologetically Indigenous.
Returning Home, Shaping Generations
In 1976, Lomahaftewa returned to New Mexico to raise her children and to accept a teaching position at IAIA in two-dimensional art. For more than forty years, she shaped generations of Native artists as a mentor, teacher, and role model. Her students include widely recognized names such as Tony Abeyta (Diné), who continues to credit her influence on his practice.
Her role at IAIA was more than academic. She embodied the school’s ethos: using new materials and methods to express Native worldviews. She taught students that abstraction could be a form of storytelling, that Native art did not need to be confined to the past, and that authenticity lay in knowing one’s heritage and translating it into contemporary forms. Lomahaftewa’s impact as an educator is profound. For decades, her name circulated among Native communities and art circles as both a formidable artist and a beloved teacher. But beyond Santa Fe, her visibility in the larger art world remained modest compared to some of her contemporaries. That is what makes this current moment so powerful: the art world is finally recognizing what her students and peers always knew.
Recognition at Last: The Museum Spotlight
In 2021, the IAIA Museum of Contemporary Native Arts (MoCNA) staged a retrospective titled The Moving Land: 60+ Years of Art by Linda Lomahaftewa. It was the first large-scale exhibition to fully honor her artistic legacy. That show planted the seeds for the surge of recognition we see today.
The momentum has only grown. In 2024–2025, Lomahaftewa’s work has been showcased in:
Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art included Lomahaftewa’s work in Space Makers: Indigenous Expression and a New American Art, which was on display from April 13 to September 30, 2024. Her early paintings Sustenance and Untitled stood alongside those of other groundbreaking “Indian Space Painters” such as Dyani White Hawk and Benjamin Harjo, Jr.
Zimmerli Art Museum, New Jersey, in Indigenous Identities: Here, Now & Always curated by Jaune Quick-to-See Smith, which includes several abstract paintings by Lomahaftewa. With 74 Indigenous artists from across North America, the show provided an overview of art from the last 50 years.
Nelimarkka Museum, Finland, part of Native American Art Today along with Cannupa Hanska Luger, Larry McNeil, Meryl McMaster, and Jaune Quick-to-See Smith. The show connects Indigenous art of North America to global Indigenous dialogues.
Fresno Art Museum, California, which is hosting Linda Lomahaftewa, Hopi-Choctaw Artist: The San Francisco Years: Paintings 1965 through 1972 and Recent Works 2008 through 2024 from August 9, 2025, to January 11, 2026. In addition to the show, Lomahaftewa was named the 2025 Council of 100 Distinguished Woman Artist, an honor reserved for trailblazers. Her exhibition there revisits her Bay Area years (1965–1976) alongside recent work, demonstrating both continuity and evolution across her career.
These exhibitions prove what collectors are starting to realize: Lomahaftewa’s art belongs in major collections, and her works are increasingly rare and sought after.
The Art Itself: A Visual Language of Spirit and Land
Lomahaftewa’s paintings and prints are instantly recognizable. They combine organic motifs—plants, birds, spirals—with symbolic references to land, migration, ceremony, and cosmology. Her works are not literal illustrations of stories but rather abstract meditations on themes that resonate across generations: sustenance, movement, resilience, and spiritual connection. The layering of shapes and colors creates rhythmic, almost musical compositions, evoking the cycles of nature and the continuity of Native life. In works like Sustenance (late 1960s) and Dancing Spirits (1996), she blends the ancient and the modern, creating visual harmonies that transcend time. Her more recent monotypes and collages, such as Four Rivers (2008), continue this trajectory, incorporating narrative symbols with contemporary printmaking experimentation.
Why Collectors Are Paying Attention
Lomahaftewa’s current wave of museum recognition signals a turning point for collectors. Her work is no longer primarily celebrated within Native circles; it is being contextualized as a crucial chapter in American modernism. Just as T.C. Cannon, Fritz Scholder, and Jaune Quick-to-See Smith command attention and market strength, Lomahaftewa’s work is poised for increasing demand. What makes this moment especially compelling is that her works remain relatively accessible compared to those of her male contemporaries. Collectors have a rare opportunity: to acquire art by a pioneering figure before the market fully adjusts to her museum-level acclaim. Owning a Lomahaftewa painting or print is more than an aesthetic choice. It is an investment in history—one that affirms the value of Native women’s voices in shaping the story of American art.
An Artist Grounded in Identity
Despite her international recognition, Lomahaftewa remains grounded. From her Santa Fe studio, she continues to explore new forms, inspired by the same values that guided her as a young student: “Never give up, and know who you are and where you come from.” Her art is not only visually striking—it is also deeply rooted in cultural memory. The spirals, corn plants, and sacred landscapes are not just design elements but carriers of history and spirit. They are reminders that Native art is not frozen in the past but vibrantly alive, evolving, and speaking to contemporary audiences.
Conclusion: The Time is Now
Linda Lomahaftewa’s story is one of resilience, creativity, and legacy. She was part of the first great wave of Native modernists, a beloved teacher to generations, and now, finally, an “overnight success” whose six decades of artistry are being celebrated worldwide. For collectors and admirers, this is a pivotal moment. Her works are not only museum-caliber; they are part of an unfolding art historical correction—an overdue recognition of Native women’s contributions to modern and contemporary art. As museums mount retrospectives and international exhibitions, the demand for her paintings and prints will only grow. To live with a Lomahaftewa work is to hold a piece of history, a piece of cultural resilience, and a piece of beauty that bridges ancient tradition with modern expression. Linda Lomahaftewa has never stopped creating, never stopped teaching, and never stopped believing in the power of art to connect people to land, spirit, and identity. The world is finally catching up.
And for collectors, the time to act is now.
