Still from Weaving Worlds. Courtesy of TricksterFilms LLC.

In this compelling and intimate portrait of economic and cultural survival through art, Navajo filmmaker Bennie Klain takes viewers into the world of contemporary Navajo weavers and their struggles for self-sufficiency. Highlighting untold stories and colorful characters involved in the making and selling of Navajo rugs, Weaving Worlds explores the lives of Diné artisans and their unique—and often controversial—relationship with reservation traders. The film artfully relates the Diné concepts of kinship and reciprocity with the human and cultural connections to sheep, wool, water and the land, showing how Indigenous artisans strive for cultural vitality and environmental sustainability in the face of globalization by “reweaving the world.”

Credits

This program was organized in conjunction with the spring 2023 exhibition Shaped by the Loom: Weaving Worlds in the American Southwest.

Support for the exhibition is generously provided by Art Bridges


Additional support provided by the Henry Luce Foundation, the Wyeth Foundation for American Art and other donors to Bard Graduate Center


This project is supported in part by the National Endowment for the Arts.


Special thanks to American Museum of Natural History.


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