Look to the Artists

THIS PAST MAY, the Center for Native Arts and Cultures opened their Matrilineal Memory exhibit, featuring Hopi artist Mikaela Shafer. Through poetry, fabric, and mixed media paintings, Shafer’s work conveys a narrative of cultural disconnection, reconnection, and generational healing.

At the center of the gallery, silk chiffon prints hung from the ceiling above a rusted metal bed frame covered in tumbleweeds. Three swathes of fabric hung in layers, featuring images of the artist herself, as if she were floating in a dreamlike state. The smell of burning piñon pine mingled with the scents of Hopi stew and tamales. The space was so warm and welcoming that it was easy to forget you were in a former warehouse.

This was Shafer’s first full show and a turning point in her career. And it would not have happened without support from the Native Arts and Cultures Foundation.

“As someone who has often felt overlooked by the art industry,” Shafer said, “NACF truly made me believe that I could pursue a career as a full-time artist, express myself the way I wanted to be seen, and share my story. Their support has been invaluable.”

Celebrating Indigenous artists and offering space for community and connection in the greater Portland area is the central goal of NACF since its founding in 2007.

NACF now has a new leader—president and CEO Shyla Spicer. Spicer has been championing the work of Native artists for many years now, but this new role broadens her influence in the Portland metro area. And this exhibit was special. It was Spicer’s first gallery opening since taking the helm in January 2024, and it was the first time the organization had put on a full show for one of their early-career grantees.

Shafer said she felt the encouragement and validation from the organization as a whole but also in a specific way from Shyla Spicer.

“Shyla has been an incredible force,” Shafer said. “Being surrounded by such strong and inspiring Indigenous leaders and artists has shown me the vast possibilities that exist out there.”

Spicer believes that art has the ability to share culture, telling stories of both past and present—and also as a way to see the future of a vibrant Indigenous arts community in Portland.

“I would love to see these voices be lifted and not just because they’re Indigenous voices or in the Indigenous sphere, but because their voice is important to the world,” Spicer said. “The Indigenous perspective is incredibly important for the new way forward.”

Spicer, an enrolled member of the Yakama Nation and a descendant of the Seneca Cayuga Tribe, who also has Filipino heritage, grew up mostly in the Portland metro area. She went to Gladstone High School and spent her free time floating down the river, going to grunge shows, and wandering the city.

In her parents, though, she had models for engagement and leadership in Indigenous organizations. Both were actively involved with the Native American Youth and Family Center (NAYA), which began in 1974 when it was founded by parent and elder volunteers to serve the Native community across the Portland metro area. Their involvement helped foster a sense of identity and connection to the urban Native community in Portland.

“NAYA became synonymous with urban connection to me,” Spicer said. “That set the course of how much I really understood the importance of our Native voice in the community in Portland and understood the connection to each other that we have. And especially to have a place to call home as people who aren’t on reservation.”

By some accounts, Portland has the ninth largest urban Indigenous population in the United States. Though data about Indigenous populations is almost always incomplete (and often doesn’t account for Indigenous populations from Canada, South America, or the Hawaiian Islands), we do know that the Native population in metro Portland is significant.

Another organization working to serve this diverse community is Mamook Tokatee, a housing development that takes its name from the Chinook Wawa phrase for “make beautiful.” The 56-unit project is co-owned by NAYA and by Community Development Partners. In addition to housing, the organization seeks to celebrate Native American art and culture, providing space for artists to live and create.

Phillip Hillaire (Lummi) is Mamook Tokatee’s housing facility art and culture coordinator, and he has partnered with Spicer and NACF. He notes that Portland is being seen at a national level by other Indigenous leaders as an example of how community organizations can work together to support their urban Native populations. He believes the NACF is key to that success in Portland, especially under the leadership of Spicer.

Spicer hasn’t always worked strictly in the Indigenous nonprofit sphere, though she’s always had an interest in business. She began her career with Nike, in a supply chain role that directly related to her undergraduate degree in business from Portland State University.

After working at Nike for 12 years, she decided to return to school. She’d always wanted to get an MBA. Interested in the world of nonprofits, and particularly those serving Indigenous communities, Spicer enrolled in University of Portland’s MBA program, focusing on strategy and entrepreneurship, ready to learn skills that she could apply directly to lifting up her community.

And she didn’t waste any time. While still working toward her degree, Spicer earned independent study credit by helping the Portland All Nations Canoe Family form their 501c3 nonprofit. The organization seeks to preserve Indigenous culture through cross-generational community building. Each year, the Canoe Family spends hours out on the rivers training for the annual Canoe Journey connecting Native canoe families from all across the Pacific Northwest. Spicer served as interim executive director from 2017 to 2018 prior to her graduation from the master’s program.

Sophia Tzeng, a former University of Portland professor who is still a mentor and friend to Spicer, appreciated that Spicer had a great deal of work experience that she brought to the class. She also shared her perspectives and was open about her experiences in the workforce as a woman of color. “She had this incredible presence, especially if there were conversations that were not always easy,” Tzeng said. “She just has this capacity to hold patient conversations and show up and contribute in a way that is really grounded.”

“The University of Portland had given me more education than I anticipated or even expected,” Spicer said. “I can’t imagine that education could be any other way at this point in my mind.” Spicer appreciated her professors for more than just their expertise. Their understanding and flexibility mattered, too. Spicer’s son, Cyrus, now 17 years old, was about 9 years old while she was attending UP. As a single mom, she had no choice but to bring him along.

“Some of the professors who I am still in contact with, we always laugh and say that Cyrus also has an MBA,” Spicer said with a smile lighting up her face. “You could see him taking it in.”

When Cyrus wasn’t taking a nap, he would sit at the desk next to his mom, absorbing knowledge and engaging in classes. Many of Spicer’s professors would invite him into the conversations and encourage Cyrus to share his opinions.

“Shyla said my classes were Cyrus’s favorite,” Tzeng said, “because I’d have them building towers and doing activities.” When Spicer graduated in 2018, she became the first member from Yakama Nation to earn an MBA. Her first position after earning her degree was executive director of the Suquamish Tribe. It was a big role, her first time working for a Native nation.

“How do you say no when the Suquamish Tribe asks you?” Spicer said.

While attending University of Portland, Spicer also created her own LLC, The Indigenous Collective, which she officially launched in 2021. That LLC helped Spicer do freelance project management and consulting on the side, which she has done mostly for female, minority-owned businesses.

The idea stemmed from watching her younger brother, Toma Villa, as he struggled to work through the business management side of things that come along with being an artist.

As a young man, Villa started his art career as a graffiti artist. Today, he is a well-known muralist, painter, carver, and sculptor across the Pacific Northwest.

In Portland, Villa painted a mural of Chief Joseph, a Nimiipuu leader, that decorates a wall at Chief Joseph Elementary School. In the Cully neighborhood, on the front of Nesika Illahee, recovery-oriented apartments co-owned by NAYA and by Community Development Partners, resides a painting of an elder holding an abalone shell filled with burning smudge. (Portland magazine featured Villa’s work that hangs in the PAE “Living Building” downtown.) His artwork is featured across the streets of downtown Seattle as well.

Spicer has always been inspired by her brother’s artistic journey. And she has always seen ways in which her business management expertise could be an asset to a working artist. She essentially views any working artist as a small business owner. They must navigate a world of contract management, keep up accounting practices, and understand the logistics of being commissioned for large projects. Spicer felt that she was in a perfect role to help her brother navigate the art world and strengthen his business.

“We joined forces and thought that this would be a great opportunity for him and any other artist in the future,” Spicer said. “I don’t want to see any of our artists in a space where they don’t have access or resources or support in these particular areas.”

This consulting work also points in a direct line to her new role at NACF. For Spicer, it is important to create spaces for “uncensored, unfettered locations for any of our artists to explore their art and what they want to share with the world.” This is exactly what the team at NACF is doing—creating spaces and opportunities for Indigenous artists.

In addition to supporting new artists like Mikaela Shafer, the organization also supports established regional Indigenous artists.

Lillian Pitt (Warm Springs, Wasco, and Yakama) is a renowned multimedia artist whose work can be found in personal collections, art galleries, and museums across the country. This summer, Pitt held a master artist workshop at the Center for Native Arts and Cultures through NACF support. She walked participants through her process of creating ceramic masks, and she shared examples of her jewelry, ceramics, glass art, prints, and sculptures.

Pitt has had a long relationship with NACF, first working with the organization’s founding president Lulani Arquette. Even the artists who have an established career have moments when they need community support. In January, Pitt’s art studio flooded due to broken pipes. The organization offered to store her art equipment, over 40 years’ worth, at the Center for Native Arts and Cultures.

“That’s what we get to do here in Portland,” Spicer said of NACF’s response. “We look after our local artists.”

Pitt appreciates the mission of the NACF, its role in the community, and its leaders. “Both [Shyla and Lulani] understood the importance of the organization and what it would take to have it continue for us Native artists, craftsmen, and cultural people,” Pitt said. “This makes me very proud of Shyla’s involvement. She is the role model for younger Native women and seems to have strong women working for her. We all need to support Shyla and the NACF staff.”

Her workshop over the summer stemmed from those stored materials and NACF’s support. During the class, Pitt let over two dozen participants each choose one of her partially completed masks and add on their own finishing touches—beads, paints, feathers, wires.

Every community member who participated—including Spicer—walked away with their very own, co-created Lillian Pitt mask. Spicer chose a stick Indian mask and added a goatee made of strips of leather to look like netting, to represent fishing people. Spicer appreciated how generous Pitt was with the larger community.

As the years have passed, Spicer has continued to make more of an effort to be involved with her Native community back home in Yakama Nation. She now keeps up with tribal council and the goings on in her community.

“I didn’t always grow up around the culture, and it wasn’t until I started creating my own generation, my son, that I wanted to be a lot closer and understand where I came from,” Spicer said. “It was really important to me to understand our traditional roots and who we are as Indigenous people. Especially being Yakama, being of this place, it really meant a lot to me.”

Some years back, Spicer went home for an important ceremony.

When Spicer’s father, Gary Villa, became the oldest living male in their family, Yakama Nation hosted a naming ceremony at the longhouse in White Swan. As part of this ceremony, they all received their Yakama names.

Her brother, Toma, was gifted a family name, Haup. Shyla and her sister were each given names that relate to water. Her sister, Terri Villa, was given the name Tse’Long which means deep water. Spicer was gifted the name Wachea’wit, which means water rapids.

“The way that it was explained to me is because I’ve always been able to navigate difficult times and be a leader in turbulent waters,” Spicer said. “It means that I’ve been through troubled waters, and it really applies to myself and how I can move forward in a good way.”

It also applies to how she leads NACF, as she looks for ways to remove barriers and offer access to opportunities to Native artists. “If one rises, we all rise,” Spicer said. “So whatever I can do to help serve the community has always been my guiding light.”

And artists—and their art—are an excellent way to build the community she wants to serve. “We need access to Indigenous art and thought and Native consciousness,” Spicer said, “because our artists are these tellers and storytellers and keepers of truth that are happening in the communities. If you want to know what’s happening, you look to the artists.”

NIKA BARTOO-SMITH is a reporter for Underscore Native News + ICT. She is an Osage and Oneida Nations descendant, with European and Indonesian heritage.