Beatien Yazz (1928-2013, Navajo)
Jimmy Toddy (Beatien Yazz translates to Little No Shirt) has won awards at every major showing of Native American art in the United States. He was one of the best known contemporary Native American painters. His paintings are traditional with fine lines featuring everyday life on the Navajo Reservation. In his early years Yazz was an art teacher.
At twelve years old, Yazz had his first sales, exhibiting his paintings. He received approximately $11 for the sale of twenty paintings. The following year, Yazz had a solo exhibition in November at the Art Center in La Jolla, California. Both the Los Angeles Times and the San Diego Union wrote articles touting the thirteen-year-old artist’s work.
In the military service during World War II, Yazz joined the Code Talkers, a branch of the marines credited with shortening the war by using the Navajo language to confuse the Japanese.
In the summer of 1947, Yazz attended Mills College to study under the Japanese artist Yasuo Kuniyoshi, which gave him exposure to working with a live model using oil paint.
Yazz’s three oldest sons, Ervin, Kevin and Marvin Toddy, are all artists. Beatien Yazz has 12 children all together, seven sons and five daughters. His wife, Ruby, also uses her artistic talents to weave textiles using natural fibers and vegetal dyes.
Beatien’s works of art usually are casein on mat board, occasionally combining pen and ink with oils. Nationally known for his illustrations for children's books, Yazz is cited in Dorothy Dunn's book American Indian Painting, in Clara Lee Tanner's Southwest Indian Painting and in the Biographical Directory of Native American Painters by Patrick Lester.
This artist's work is included in the Philbrook Museum of Art in Tulsa, Oklahoma; the Denver Art Museum, Wheelwright Museum of the American Indian in Santa Fe, New Mexico and Southwest Museum of Los Angeles, California to name a few. Yazz Navajo Painter by Sallie R. Wagner, J.J. Brody and Beatien Yazz was published in 1983 by Northland Press.
