Humor on the Rez--a Pendant by Clarence Lee

When you think of Southwest Indian jewelry and silverwork, many words come to mind, but "humor" is usually not one of them. There is not much funny about the long years of practice it takes to become a skilled silversmith, nor the long hours of filing, stamping and polishing it takes to create a work of art. Great turquoise may make someone gasp, but it rarely makes them laugh. Yet the Navajo are known for having a highly developed sense of humor, which comes out in some of their pictorial weavings. So, why not in silversmithing, which remained a very serious art form until the arrival of one Clarence Lee around 1977.

Lee had always had a talent for drawing, which was not a skill that dovetailed well with silversmithing. But one day he shaped a piece of silver into a form resembling a dog, and from that humble beginning he expanded into scenes of reservation life from when he was young. Before his death in 2011, he had become the originator of the storyteller style of Navajo jewelry, where each piece is a vignette of Navajo life. Which brings us to the pendant in question:

In this pendant, a Navajo woman in traditional blouse and skirt is walking through a landscape that included the sandstone mitten buttes of Monument Valley (which, for added effect, are rendered in copper to mimic the buttes' red color.) Note the moccasins with a large silver button on the ankle, the pleats in the skirt, and the silver buttons lining the arm and shoulder of the woman. There are silver clouds in the sky, and even a sun done in a Zuni inlaid sunface (it is quite likely that Lee purchased these Zuni sunfaces, which often show up in his work, from Zuni artisans rather than making them himself.) Right down to the flowering yucca plant, it is as Navajo a scene as you can imagine.

The humor comes in when you see that the woman is not alone in the scene. By her side is a wooly sheep with its head turned up towards the woman. And in the woman's arms is a little lamb, clearly belonging to the mother sheep. With careful looking, you can see that the mother sheep has a worried look on her face, as if she in wondering what this woman is going to do with her little lamb. The lamb, on the other hand, does not seem to have a care in the world, and is enjoying the ride. After all, why walk when you can ride?

Lee was known for incorporating funny animals into his scenes of reservation life--any pickup truck would have dogs running alongside or sitting in the back enjoying the ride, and cats would often gather by the Hogan to cause trouble while the women did their weaving. There is always something funny about the animals, because Lee said that his memories were happy ones. As a result, the worried mother sheep and the carefree little lamb make us happy as well.

This pendant is SOLD.