Diné (Navajo) Original Painting of a Buffalo Hunt by Quincy Tahoma [SOLD]

Quincy Tahoma attended the Santa Fe Indian School for four years, from 1936-1940, entering in the seventh grade. He was a student at the same time as Harrison Begay, Pablita Velarde, Geronima Montoya, Andy Tsihnahjinnie, and Gerald Nailor, and studied under the tutelage of Dorothy Dunn at The Studio.

When World War II broke out, he attempted to join the service but an arm that he had broken as a youngster, that was never successfully corrected, caused him to be rejected.  He stayed in Santa Fe while his friends served in the military. 

Tahoma displayed a wide variety of styles in his paintings. One of the subjects he favored was that of a buffalo hunt.  Sometimes he painted a lone Indian pursuing a buffalo and at other times he amassed a large group of Indians charging after a large group of buffalo.  That is the case with this painting.  There are nine Indians involved, five in the main center of the painting and the remainder is the far background.  Some of the hunters use spears and others use bows and arrows.

This is one of the most dramatic of his buffalo scenes.  One Indian and his horse have been thrown down on the ground and it appears a buffalo is heading their way.  There is a baby buffalo running alongside its mother. 

The modern-looking cloud in the upper right has faces of three Yei deities looking down on the action and presumably offering protection to the Indians.  There are even rodents running in the foreground.  Overall, it is an action packed image executed in phenomenal detail.  It is certainly one of Tahoma’s masterpieces.  It is signed and dated 1940 in lower right with his traditional cartouche.  That is the year he was a senior at the Santa Fe Indian School.

Tahoma painted to the edges of the paper so it has been floated on hinges so that the mat does not cover any of the paper on which it is painted.  It has just been framed using all acid-free materials and a brown wood frame.

Condition: original condition

Provenance: from the collection of a New York resident

Recommended Reading:  Quincy Tahoma, The Life and Legacy of a Navajo Artist [SOLD] by Charnell Havens, et. al.