Mojave Pottery Male Figurine with Shell Hieshe Jewelry [SOLD]

C4127B-mojave.jpg

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Artist Unknown
  • Category: Figurines
  • Origin: Mojave Tribe
  • Medium: clay, fabric, hair, hieshe
  • Size: 10-½” tall
  • Item # C4127B
  • SOLD

If one person could be credited as the catalyst for making Mojave pottery figurines a known and respected Native American collectible, it would be Santa Fe ceramist and author, Rick Dillingham.  Something about these figurines captured his interest and he spent years searching for them and building up a collection for his pleasure.

Over a number of years, Rick amassed a collection of 214 Mojave pottery—human figurines, animal figurines, pitchers, cooking and eating vessels, spoons, scoops, pipes and other shapes.  His collection represented most shapes made by Mojave potters and made it valuable for future study by academics. With this in mind, and a desire that the collection not be broken up, he left the entire collection to the School for Advanced Research, Indian Arts Research Center, Santa Fe.

A few of these figurines escaped his attention and were collected by Chuck and Jan Rosenak, noted authors and Navajo folk art collectors.  The Rosenaks were attracted to them because of their folk art nature. When the Rosenaks moved from Santa Fe to Florida in 2004, Adobe Gallery acquired their collection of 10 Mojave male and female figurines.  We have posted a male and female pair to our site already and a single seated male figure, too. Now we are posting the fourth from the Rosenak collection

This one from the Rosenak collection is a standing male figurine.  He wears a fabric skirt cinched around his waist with a strip of cloth.  His necklace and earrings were fashioned from seashell and formed in hieshe shape.  His hair is attached to his head in traditional manner and secured with a red fabric headband.  For security, a metal stand is provided.

It may never be possible to establish when the earliest Mojave figurative pottery was made because the Mojave custom was to destroy everything associated with a person at death.  The first documented one was collected in 1854 by Jules Marcon, geologist on the Whipple expedition. Furst 2001:79

This male figurine probably dates to the early 1900s. It is not signed with the name of the maker.  


Condition: this Mojave Pottery Male Figurine with Shell Hieshe Jewelry is in very good condition

Provenance: from the estate of Henry Christensen III of New York who had purchased it from Adobe Gallery in 2004.  Adobe Gallery had previously acquired it from the Chuck and Jan Rosenak folk art collection.

Reference: Mojave Pottery, Mojave People—The Dillingham Collection of Mojave Ceramics by Jill Leslie Furst

Close up view of the tattoo areas of the body of this Mojave figurine.


Artist Unknown
  • Category: Figurines
  • Origin: Mojave Tribe
  • Medium: clay, fabric, hair, hieshe
  • Size: 10-½” tall
  • Item # C4127B
  • SOLD

C4127B-mojave.jpgC4127B-large.jpg Click on image to view larger.