In Animal Dance, Tony Abeyta channels raw movement and ritual energy through a stark palette of black and red. Masked figures with ovoid eyes overlap and collide across the surface, their fractured forms recalling both ceremonial presence and the dynamism of modernist abstraction. The composition carries a Picasso-like intensity, where bodies and symbols dissolve into rhythm rather than narrative.

The work is encased in a hand-hammered copper frame created by the artist himself, its indented, oxidized surface echoing the imagery within. Copper—long associated with energy, protection, and transformation—extends the painting beyond the canvas, reinforcing the sense of dance as both physical and spiritual act. Together, painting and frame form a unified object, asserting Abeyta’s synthesis of Diné ceremonial consciousness and contemporary abstraction.