Fred Kabotie - Great Hopi Artist

Page 10 June 2019 THE INDIAN TRADER

Fred Kabotie

Great Hopi Artist and All Around Good Guy

By Tom Surface

An internationally celebrated artist, silversmith, illustrator, potter, author, curator, and educator, Fred Kabotie (1900-1986) was born into a highly traditional Hopi family at Second Mesa, Arizona. Born of the Bluebird Clan, his family was one of the founding families of the village of Hotevilla, where his family and clan members were committed to preserving the Hopi culture and traditions that were under constant attack from growing Western influences. Even as a young child, he drew images of Hopi Katsinas with bits of coal and earth pigments on rocks near his home.

His given Hopi name was Naaqavo’ma, meaning “The sun coming up day after day.” His paternal grandfather gave him the nickname Qaavotay, meaning “Tomorrow.” However, his Anglo teacher at his first school mistakenly spelled his name “Kabotie”, which became his official name to the outside world.

He was soon sent off to the Indian School in Santa Fe where his art teacher – against government policy - encouraged her students to embrace their culture in their paintings. (She was ultimately fired for her efforts.) Kabotie painted Katsinas because he missed home, and reportedly sold his first painting for 50 cents to the school’s carpentry teacher. As a teenager during his summer vacations, Kabotie learned from established Native artists and worked on archeological excavations. Soon after his graduation from Indian school, the talents of the 20-year-old Kabotie were in high demand.

A LIFETIME OF ACCOMPLISHMENTS

Shortly after completing his schooling, The Museum of New Mexico hired Kabotie to paint and bind books for a salary of $60 per month and his former art teacher, who had previously lost her job encouraging Nativeinspired art, hired him to illustrate books. The George Gustav Heye Center in New York City commissioned the young Kabotie to paint a series depicting Hopi ceremonies and Kabotie began selling to private collectors under his Anglo or Hopi names. His notoritity continued to soar in the 1930’s when he was commissioned to paint the murals in the Desert View Watchtower at the Grand Canyon, a popular visitor’ site to this day. Kabotie was chosen as an advisor and Native culture curator for the 1939 Golden Gate International Exposition in San Francisco. The following year, he was commissioned by the Peabody Museum in Cambridge, Mass., to reproduce the prehistoric kiva murals uncovered at the destroyed village of Awatovi on the Hopi Reservation. Building on his recognized expertise in Native American cultures, Kabotie won a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1945. This monetary grant enabled him to complete an in-depth study of the culture and pottery of the Mimbres people and write his subsequent book, Designs From the Ancient Mimbreños.

Kabotie’s true calling in life was preserving Hopi culture and traditions for future generations. He had a strong desire to “spread Hopi culture to young children.” In 1937 when Oraibi High School opened for Hopi students, Kabotie was among the first teachers hired and taught art there for 22 years until 1959. Kabotie taught hundreds of Hopi students, some of whom went on to have very successful art careers. In 1960, Kabotie travelled to New Delhi, India, where he represented the United States Department of Agriculture at the World Agricultural Fair.

ACCOMPLISHED SILVERSMITH At the encouragement of the Museum of Northern Arizona, Kabotie along with his cousin Paul Saufkie, developed a jewelry style unique to the

Hopi people – a distinct overlay technique with designs inspired by traditional Hopi pottery. This process and designs helped distinguish Hopi silver works from silversmiths of Zuni, Navajo and other Southwestern Pueblo tribes. Kabotie’s first piece of jewelry was commissioned as a gift to First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt. Following the end of World War II, the Indian Service and GI Bill funded jewelry classes for returning Native American service members as a way to encourage a trade craft. Kabotie and Saufkie created the Hopi Silvercraft Cooperative Guild in 1949 to showcase their students’ work. As part of his drive to promote Hopi traditional culture and to assist his students in marketing their work, his lifelong dream was realized with the opening of the Hopi Cultural Center in 1971.

But Kabotie’s many pursuits and cultural interests left him very little time to paint and he produced very few pieces after the mid-1950s. However, he remains best known for his painting, and is estimated to have finished around 500 paintings in his lifetime. Kabotie did not always sign his work, unless the piece was for sale. Some of his creations remained unsigned. The fact that Kabotie’s Hopi culture was almost taken away from him made him determined to preserve the Hopi culture in his art. His paintings are seen as realistic, and colorful with dynamic solid strong figures. They reflect his love for his culture and the Hopi people. The Katsinas used in his paintings are still seen at Hopi ceremonies. His style and vision continue to influence future generations of Native American artists.

Editor’s Note: Recently, Fred Kabotie’s original murals were painstakingly restored at the Painted Desert Inn, a National Historic Landmark located in the Petrified Forest National Park along Interstate 40 in Arizona.