The Call of Beauty – Masterworks by Nampeyo of Hopi – Book by Edwin L. Wade and Allan R. Cooke

Reviewed by James D. Balestrieri

The Call of Beauty, Masterworks by Nampeyo of Hopi, by Edwin L.Wade and Allan R. Cooke, is a new, beautifully written and sumptuously illustrated book on this remarkable artist. But more important than the beauty of the book is its groundbreaking view of Indigenous art forms. Most books on Native American arts confine themselves to the ethnographic background, implying by omission, if not more overtly, that Indigenous arts fall short of the personal aspirations that mark artistic traditions historically seen as more sophisticated. In The Call of Beauty, the aesthetic power and artistic value of the oeuvre of one Indigenous artist, Nampeyo, is convincingly asserted. Throughout, Wade and Cooke discuss thorny questions of beauty, quality, and taste, acknowledging their position as non-Natives, chronicling their decades of study, and detailing their criteria of judgement.

Nampeyo was born circa 1860 on First Mesa, atop a sandstone Pueblo some hundred miles northeast of Flagstaff, Arizona. Women on both sides of her family were potters. In the 1880s, ancient pottery forms, especially Sikyatki pottery, inspired Nampeyo and brought her to the attention of anthropologists, dealers, and collectors. Not content to tell this story, however, The Call of Beauty, Masterworks by Nampeyo of Hopi centers its gaze on Nampeyo’s artistic vision, technical innovations, and her interpretation of her world through extraordinary works, making the case for her as an important world artist, and, in her own way, a modernist. As Wade writes, “Nampeyo created an aesthetic, intellectual, and emotive portal into the core of Hopi experience, but also into the transcultural experience of beauty.” Some of Nampeyo’s finest works can be seen in the Allan and Judith Cooke Collection of Hopi Pottery, on view at Western Spirit: Scottsdale’s Museum of the West. westernspirit.org.

The Call of Beauty, Masterworks by Nampeyo of Hopi is currently available at the Sue and Robert Karatz Store at Western Spirit. www.shop.scottsdalemuseumwest.org/books.