Painting Entitled “Tesuque Deer Dancer #3 [SOLD]

Unquestionably the outstanding Tesuque Pueblo painter and one of the most outstanding of all the pueblo artists was Patrick Swazo Hinds. Adopted at the age of 9 by a California family, Swazo grew up off the reservation but returned every summer to Tesuque. It is this exposure to a different way of life that is probably responsible for his style of art and that, in turn, is responsible for his wide appeal and his great success as an artist.

Swazo exhibited widely in the West, with many general or one-man shows in Berkeley and San Francisco, and in Arizona, New Mexico and Oklahoma.  Some of his one-man shows were at the Heard Museum, Phoenix; Pacific School of Religion, Berkeley; and the Beaux Arts Gallery, Oakland—all in the 1960s—and another show, a very superior one, at the Heard Museum in 1970.  His awards at these and other shows are much too many to mention.  He frequently won First and Purchase awards.

Swazo easily combined a Native American inheritance by birth with an Anglo education to produce a painting style he described as "Indian theme to nonobjective abstract."  He is still recognized as a major artist of the 20th century.

In this painting—which appears to be oil pastel on artist board—Swazo illustrates a pueblo man as a Tesuque Deer Dancer, most likely during a pueblo plaza dance.  He is illustrated completely in brown color, with highlights of red, green and white oil pastel.  One can almost visualize Swazo with a brush loosely and casually applying strokes to the board.  It is this loose style, with little fine detail, that makes his art so appealing.

The painting is signed Swazo in lower left in broad strokes.  It is titled on verso and dated 1971.  

Condition: original condition

Recommended Reading:  Southwest Indian Painting a changing art by Clara Lee Tanner

Provenance: from the collection of a Texas resident