About
Chip Thomas, aka “jetsonorama,” is a photographer, public artist, activist and physician who worked between Monument Valley and the Grand Canyon on the Navajo Nation from 1987 to 2023. There, he coordinated the Painted Desert Project – a community-building effort which manifested as a constellation of murals across western Navajo Nation painted by artists from all over the world.
Thomas’ own public artwork consists of enlarged black and white photographs pasted on structures along the roadside on the Navajo Nation and elsewhere. His ethos is to reflect back to communities the love and beauty that they have shared with him. In 2026 he was named a MacArthur Fellow, an honor he credits to the communities whose stories made the work possible.
