RIO GRANDE KACHINA WITH TABLETA

Details

RIO GRANDE KACHINA WITH TABLETA
Carved of cottonwood with attached arms, beak and tableta. The arms, attached at the shoulders, are slightly bent forward and have articulated fingers curved inward to hold dance implements. The kachina wears a kilt with painted sash and yellow and red body paint. The case mask has slit eyes and rain cloud symbols painted on the cheeks and above the protruding, hooked beak. Atop the head is a large tableta, the center of which is painted with a pinwheel motif flanked by cloud symbols under which are notches representing falling rain.
19½ x 10 in. (49.5 x 25.4 cm.)

Provenance

Ex Alan Kessler Collection, sold at Sotheby's, 1997 lot 21

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Lot Essay

Many of the kachinas originating in the Rio Grande pueblos are characterized by a rather unique head gear called a tableta, or tablita...The tableta is painted with designs that are characteristic of the dance in which it appears. Clouds of incredible variety, butterflies, sunflowers, and lightning in every form from abstract to realistic, may adorn these head pieces.
-Kachinas: The Barry Goldwater Collection by Barton Wright. 1975, p. 41.

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