Female+Navajo+Figure;+Male+Navajo+Figure

Date: ca. 1962-1964
 * [[image:https://s3.amazonaws.com/saam.media/files/styles/x_large/s3/images/1986/1986.65.385_1a.jpg?itok=1T4C3j3y width="113" height="349" link="@https://americanart.si.edu/artwork/female-navajo-figure-33687"]] || itle: **Female Navajo Figure**

Artist: **Charlie Willeto** Born: Nageezi, New Mexico 1900 Died: Nageezi, New Mexico 1965

Medium: carved and painted wood Dimensions: 66 1/2 x 16 1/4 x 14 1/4 in. (169.0 x 41.3 x 36.2 cm.) Smithsonian American Art Museum Gift of Herbert Waide Hemphill, Jr. and museum purchase made possible by Ralph Cross Johnson

Accession: 1986.65.385 || Date: ca. 1962-1964
 * [[image:https://s3.amazonaws.com/saam.media/files/styles/x_large/s3/images/1986/1986.65.342_1a.jpg?itok=K6GTOZ_V width="116" height="337" link="@https://americanart.si.edu/artwork/male-navajo-figure-27729"]] || Title: **Male Navajo Figure**

Artist: **Charlie Willeto** Born: Nageezi, New Mexico 1900 Died: Nageezi, New Mexico 1965

Medium: carved and painted wood <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">Dimensions: 66 1/4 x 16 1/2 x 10 1/4 in. (168.3 x 42.0 x 26.1 cm.) <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">Smithsonian American Art Museum <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">Gift of Herbert Waide Hemphill, Jr. and museum purchase made possible by Ralph Cross Johnson

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">Accession: 1986.65.342 || <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">Willeto was a Navajo sheepherder who started carving just a few years before his death. These figures, with their hair bound Navajo style, stood outside the Mauzy Trading Post where Willeto exchanged work for groceries. Originally brightly painted, their color has been dulled by exposure to the elements. Most of the four hundred carvings Willeto created before his death are small, reminiscent of the figurines used in the Navajo curing rite, `a-wéésjíín `análnééh. These large sculptures differ from the small, stylized carvings only in scale, and their painted markings may be decorative reminders of the jeweled inlay and painted bands found on the healing figures.
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">Exhibition Label: **

Charlie Willeto - biography, Kohler Foundation
 * Resources: **

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">Artist Biography <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">SAAM Collections Page (female) <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">SAAM Collections Page (male)
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">Links: **