Untitled Painting of Goat Herder with Goats [SOLD]

Most pueblo artist’s paintings, especially the early students of The Studio of the Santa Fe Indian School, dwell on ceremonial items or individual dancers.  That is what Esther Hoyt, the San Ildefonso Day School teacher from 1900 to 1907 encouraged them to do.  It is also what Dorothy Dunn, the teacher at The Studio, encouraged of her students in the 1930s.

Awa Tsireh has provided a refreshing image of a daily ritual—a young man herding his goats along.  In typical fashion of The Studio style of presentation, there is no ground plane, no plants, and nothing in the sky.  All we see are goats and the herder.

This is a most creative presentation by this artist.  The grouping of goats of all colors presented in lower left of the paper, leaving the large expanse of unpainted area, is an excellent layout by the artist.  The single figure of a young boy off to the far right adds balance to the imagery. The painting is estimated to have been completed in 1925, when Awa Tsireh was 27 years old.

This Untitled Painting of Goat Herder with Goats is illustrated on page 205 of Through Their Eyes—Indian Painting in Santa Fe, 1918-1945 by Michelle McGeough, Wheelwright Museum of the American Indian, 2009 

Condition: very good condition

Provenance:

-        Formerly in the collection of Alice Corbin Henderson (1881-1949), famous Santa Fe poet and author and a major collector of New Mexico early paintings, who moved to Santa Fe in 1916 for a cure of her tuberculosis.

-        Currently in the collection of Charlotte G. Mittler, purchased from Robert Nichols Gallery, Santa Fe, 1992

Recommended Reading: Through Their Eyes—Indian Painting in Santa Fe, 1918-1945 by Michelle McGeough, Wheelwright Museum of the American Indian, 2009