Featured Kachina discovery

Here are a few more items from my mother-in-law's estate.
She was from the Isleta Pueblo here in NM, and her house was full of native art. I am gradually acquiring things from her house.
We were going through a closet, and these two Kachinas were in a box, packed away. The note on top said that they belonged to her sister who died 8 years ago.
Mother-in-law was a devout Baptist, and she did not approve of the Native religions. We weren't surprised to find these hidden out of sight.

This first one is Crow Mother by Ivan Jackson.
It's so beautifully carved and painted!


This next one is Hopi Warrior Maiden
by M. Sakiestewa

 

The first one is awesome. And the second one is... yikes!!

 

both nice
neither is antique..

 

@Taupou
@2manybooks

 

@Potteryplease @komokwa
I don't know much about kachinas, but I love the one by Ivan Jackson

 

Yikes is right! I guess she's supposed to frighten us!

 

Me too......it's very involved.

Katsina's have a long history....& at one point Navajo artists started carving them for the market.....not that they were bad....but they are a Hopi cultural tradition..

 

Agreed. The first one is really great!

 

If the Hopi warrior maiden is who I think she is, she is usually depicted as having her long hair coiled up in a whorl, a la Princess Leia, on one side, loose on the other, because she did not have time to finish with her hair before the call to battle came.

 

Wonderful finds, stracci.

These are representations of Kachina, made to be sold. As such they don't have the value of Kachina in a spiritual sense, but they are beautiful in their own right. But I do understand your Mother-in-law's viewpoint.

Ivan Jackson is Hopi, and his 'Kachina' is truly beautiful.
If he is the Ivan Jackson who was also a medicine man, he has done some things he shouldn't have (putting it mildly). That doesn't seem to influence the value of his art, and good art is good art whatever the personality of the maker or their wrongdoings. But I thought you'd better know because a buyer could bring it up.

 

Yikes on Ivan Jackson.

 

I can't find anything that says that he was both an artist and a medicine man. But anything's possible!

 

Now my kachina has bad juju!
Humphhhh!

 

Trade Ivan's bad juju for $800 & give the money to an abused NA children's organization.
Whatever energies an 'inanimate' object retains is beyond my primitive brain to divine-handmade piece though ?

 

If he is the same man, what he did was bad. But he was still a good artist, and his kachina figures sell.

 

I have...& had bought and sold fine art from a 1st nations man who was thrown off his reserve for being an abusive spouse .

I had the chance to meet him...& did not take it.

His artwork still sells well...
his behaviour..........another matter !

 

Whether or not to buy from someone is always a personal choice, and I respect either decision. In this case you already have it, so you might as well sell it for a good price.
I think this one is even nicer than his usual work.

 

This begs the question......
Can we judge art by the behavior of the artist?
If we look through history, some of the best artists, musicians, actors etc. were guilty of similar offenses.

 

I don't, but I understand it if others do.

Or even worse, like Caravaggio, who was an absolute artistic genius.

 

Too very true.I still find many of these raging misogynists,racists,predators to be very interesting,even transcendent artists.
If i limited myself to sublime artists who are also perfect human beings-i wouldn't be reading,viewing or listening to much of anything.
I'm sure the martyred saints had plenty of (now suppressed & censored) human baggage.