Maiden Masks

One reviewer wrote :

"Michelle Tsosie Naranjo’s delicate watercolors possess a mystery and magic that doesn’t reek of forced spirituality. Her curious, abstracted mask forms float ambiguously on sheets of handmade rice paper, textured and saturated with deep blue and magenta pigments."

Born in Albuquerque in 1959, Michelle is the daughter of Carol and Paul Tsosie (Navajo).  Her marriage to a Santa Clara man shifted her orientation to Espanola, an urban center in the heart of the Rio Grande Pueblos, impacting the subject matter of her paintings.

In July 1989 she was awarded the Best of Fine Arts at the Fortieth Navajo Show at the Museum of Northern Arizona. Her work was included in an exhibition at the San Diego Museum of Man titled "Paths Beyond Tradition" (May 20-September 4. 1989).

Naranjo's work is in the permanent collection of the Heard Museum and she has won several First place awards at the Santa Fe Indian Market, as well as the Patrick Swazo Hinds Memorial Award for the most Promising Painter in 1981.

An artist featured in Patricia Broder's impressive publication Earth Songs, Moon Dreams Paintings by American Indian Women,we are told of the Naranjo's involvement with fashion as well as art.