Now that the new year is here, treat yourself to a new experience: Meet Hopi R2-D2, the first Indigenous android.

You’ll find Hopi R2-D2 zipping around in one of the most unusual and inventive exhibitions to come our way in a long time. “The Return of the Force” fills the big gallery at Center of Southwest Studies at Fort Lewis College now through September. It’s a take-the-family exhibition, whether you are a Star Wars aficionado or not. And it’s worth more than one visit.

Guest Curator Duane Koyawena (Hopi/Tewa) and Center Curator Elizabeth Quinn MacMillan have updated and expanded a show that started at the Museum of Northern Arizona.

In 2019, “The Force is With Our People,” opened in Flagstaff, inspired by Curator Tony Thibodeau, who was not alone tapping into a cultural phenomenon. Since its debut in 1977, the “Star Wars” juggernaut in popular culture has influenced generations around the world. That “Star Wars” magic stems from George Lucas’ epic fairy tale in which archetypes and universal themes tap into our collective imagination.

If you go

WHAT: “The Return of the Force,” a multimedia art exhibition about the intersection between Star Wars and Indigenous culture.

WHEN: Now through September. Winter semester hours 1 to 4 p.m. Monday through Thursday and by appointment.

WHERE: Center of Southwest Studies at Fort Lewis College, 1000 Rim Drive.

TICKETS: Free admission. $5 suggested donation.

MORE INFORMATION: By appointment only. Contact the Center at 247-7456 or http://swcenter.fortlewis.edu.

The links that lead to the Center’s splendid exhibit date from 1977, 2014 and 2016. The first Star Wars film, “A New Hope,” premiered almost 50 years ago, when the story’s deep roots were nourished by the late anthropologist Joseph Campbell. He in turn, drew inspiration from ancient Greek mythology.

The connections have been simmering a long time.

In 2014, Manuelito Wheeler, director of the Navajo Nation Museum, in Window Rock, Arizona, had the brilliant idea to dub a Star Wars film in the Navajo language.

Wheeler collaborated with Lucasfilm to make that happen, and it was a huge success. Another important stepping stone connecting Star Wars with Native culture came about in 2016, when Lee Fracis IV created The Indigenous Comic Con. Like other similar conventions, it started a phenomenon that underscored the parallels between Star Wars and Indigenous culture. Add Thibodeau’s 2019 exhibition, Koyawena’s enthusiasm, with the help of curatorial consultant Samantha Honanie, and the circle spins again to FLC.

Guest curated by Koyawena and Center Curator Elizabeth Quinn MacMillan, the new exhibit, underscores the enduring nature of the connections between pop culture and the deep cultural roots of Native American history.

With loans from the private collections of Kim Lohnes (Diné) and Sheldon Nuñez-Velarde (Jicarilla Apache), plus four works from the Center’s collections, this is a distinctive exhibition.

You’ll find traditional, realistic paintings in oil and acrylic – with a twist. You’ll find sculpture in a variety of media. There are unusual textiles, jewelry, mixed-media works and an interesting spin on famous photographs.

One of the most unexpected works is a wall of T-shirts by visual artist and filmmaker Steven Paul Judd (Kiowa, Choctaw) with The NTVS (The Natives).

For more than a decade, this clothing company has been inventing imagery for jackets, T-shirts and other items by adapting contemporary slogans with Native imagery. NTVS appropriating some of Edward Curtis’s iconic and highly romanticized images of Native Americans is no surprise.

The T-shirts merge famous photos with Star Wars imagery in unexpected ways. If you’re familiar with the Curtis canon, you can only chuckle at the odd combinations.

Judd’s satirical exercise drove me to Timothy Egan’s prizewinning Curtis biography from 2012.

Curtis (1868-1952) was an ethnographic photographer who went West to document more than 80 tribes through more than 40,000 photographs. In the process, he also underwent a sea-change in his attitude toward Native Americans.

As a result of the T-shirts in the Star Wars exhibit, all that came back into focus. And the dialogue between two or three cultures continues.

While the artwork is the central reason for seeing the exhibit, be sure to read the excellent text panels. In concise, well-written excerpts, they summarize the history of this unusual pairing, shared mythologies, cultural boundaries, and the panels pose the basic question: Why Star Wars?

Judith Reynolds is an arts journalist and member of the American Theatre Critics Association.