The University of Arizona Press
June 4, 2026
Ann Lane Hedlund, author of Mac Schweitzer A Southwest Maverick and Her Art, gave a talk to the Arizona Archaeological and Historical Society on April 21, 2026, at the San Pedro Chapel in Tucson. In this richly illustrated talk, Ann draws from the artist’s letters, photo albums, and published reviews to tell the story of Mac’s creative and adventurous life in the Southwest, along with some of the Tucson anthropologists and artists she knew from the 1940s into the early 1960s.
Artist Mac (Mary Alice Cox) Schweitzer (1921-1962) was well known in the Tucson and Scottsdale art colonies of the mid-twentieth century. Mac’s close friends, mentors and patrons—many of whom were associated with the University of Arizona and anthropology or art—included Fred Kabotie and Charles Loloma. Mac’s prize-winning watercolors, oil paintings, prints, and sculptures ranged from naturalistic and stylized studies of Sonoran Desert animals to impressionistic landscapes to moody abstractions. A keen observer of Indigenous life, she sketched and painted scenes of the Navajo (Diné), Hopi, Zuni, O’odham, and Yaqui (Yoeme) peoples and events. She depicted Ancestral Puebloan sites at Mesa Verde, Canyon de Chelly, and Navajo National Monument, and illustrated several books. At least one archaeological monograph contains many humorous as well as informative vignettes.
When reflecting on Mac Schweitzer, Hedlund said in her presentation, “Today I want to introduce you to an absolutely adventuring woman in love with the West from 75 years ago. . . You’re going to meet an amazing distinctive Tucson artist who becomes an interpreter of the Southwest during the mid-20th century and then disappears for almost 60 years. In short, we are rediscovering who this artist is to us in our time, and who she is to the art of the American West.”
Ann Lane Hedlund is a cultural anthropologist who collaborates with Indigenous weavers and other visual artists to understand creative processes in social contexts. From 1997 to 2013 she served as a curator at Arizona State Museum and professor at University of Arizona, Tucson, where she also directed the nonprofit Center for Tapestry Studies. She is author of Navajo Weaving in the Late Twentieth Century and Gloria F. Ross & Modern Tapestry, among other works.