Chip Thomas moved to the Navajo Nation in Northern Arizona in 1987 to work as a physician in a community with limited healthcare and thus repay a National Health Services Corps scholarship. The plan was to stay there four years. Thirty-four years later, Chip Thomas is not only still living and working as a physician in the Navajo or Diné Nation; he has also become an artist beloved by his community and increasingly by admirers from all over the world.

Since 2009 Chip, an avid photographer since his early teens, has been printing out large-scale enlargements of his photos of his neighbors and community and affixing them to structures throughout the Diné Nation, reflecting the beauty and stories of the people and their culture back to themselves. Sometimes the murals also tackle the many social issues and environmental issues, such as the sickening effects of uranium mining in the 20^th century, that have challenged the Diné for generations. During the pandemic, Chip created murals to share vital health information with his community, which was disproportionately affected by COVID-19.

In this interview with Rob Kramer and Pier Carlo Talenti, Chip recounts how he earned his neighbors’ trust, first as a physician and later as an artist, and harnessed his combined skills to serve and improve the community’s overall wellness.