Lot 235
Mamie Deschillie (Navajo, 1920-2010). Women on horses. Mixed media: cardboard, paint, fabric, paper, graphite, roving, yarn, ribbon, and beads, n.d. Both signed on front legs of horses. These two striking mixed media figures exemplify Mamie Deschillie's imaginative and deeply tactile approach to artmaking. Fashioned from cut and painted cardboard, the works depict two women astride brightly colored horses - one emerald green, the other golden yellow - rendered with bold, graphic simplicity and unmistakable charm. Each rider is dressed in hand-sewn clothing adorned with small embellishments, their hair fashioned from soft wool roving and their jewelry carefully composed of stringed beads and ribbon. Deschillie's inventive use of everyday materials - cardboard, fabric scraps, yarn, and paper - reflects her lifelong practice of transforming humble resources into animated expressions of Navajo life and storytelling. Size of larger (green): 8.5" W x 12.8" H (21.6 cm x 32.5 cm)
Her female riders, with their expressive faces and vibrant attire, embody a sense of movement, personality, and humor. The bright palette and decorated surfaces evoke both the pageantry of traditional Navajo dress and the artist's unique aesthetic language, born from a fusion of memory, environment, and imagination.
Created in the later decades of Deschillie's career, these works illustrate her signature style: an interplay of sculptural form, color, and texture that celebrates both individuality and community. Each figure, though whimsical in construction, stands as a testament to the artist's power to animate the materials of daily life with spirit and joy.
About the artist: Mamie Deschillie was a Navajo folk artist celebrated for her inventive and deeply personal interpretations of traditional materials and themes. Born on the Navajo Nation Reservation, likely in either Chaco or Burnham, New Mexico, she lived for most of her life near Farmington. A mother of five, she began creating art following the death of her husband, Chee Ford Deschillie, in 1979.
Raised in a traditional Navajo household, she spoke little English and was often described as living "the Navajo way." She wore velvet clothing, her attire reflecting a lifelong respect for custom and tradition. Though she received little formal education, Deschillie learned to weave as a child and gained early recognition for her weaving before expanding into other art forms.
Her earliest works were sun-dried mud toys, molded into whimsical animals - cows, sheep, buffalo, horses, and riders - adorned with fur, cloth, jewelry, and bright paint. In the 1980s, she began producing vibrant cardboard cutouts of animals native to the Southwest, as well as exotic species she had encountered through books and circuses. These pieces, ranging from small ten-inch figures to monumental three-foot works, were often embellished with found objects and beads, turning humble materials into lively expressions of imagination and spirit.
Deschillie's art reflects the synthesis of traditional Navajo lifeways with an individual creative voice that resisted confinement to any single medium. Her works are now held in major collections, including the Smithsonian American Art Museum, the Museum of Northern Arizona, and the Wheelwright Museum of the American Indian.
Through her late-life artistic journey, Mamie Deschillie transformed everyday materials into vivid reflections of Navajo identity, memory, and joy.
Provenance: private Rochester, Minnesota, USA collection, acquired from 1990 -1998
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#192092
- Condition: Some light surface wear, but otherwise both are intact and excellent .
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