Maynard Dixon (American, 1875-1946) Sacred Rock, Walpi, 1923 Crayon on paper 13-7/8 x 16 inches (35.2 x 40.6 cm) (sheet) Signed and dated lower left: M.D. / Aug-Oct 1923 PROVENANCE: Mark Sublette; Medicine Man Gallery, Maynard Dixon Museum, Tucson, Arizona; Museum of Fine Arts, Fanta Fe, New Mexico; Zaplin Lampert Gallery, New York; Private collection, Los Angeles, California, EXHIBITED: Medicine Man Gallery, Maynard Dixon Museum, Tucson, Arizona, n.d. LITERATURE: D. J. Hagerty, The Life of Maynard Dixon, Layton, Utah, Gibbs, 2010, p. 149, illustrated. ArtGeek, "Unexpected Riches in an Unexpected Place." Medium, January 24 2018, illustrated. (URL: artgeek.medium.com/unexpected-riches-in-an-unexpected-place-e4e7f99be7c2.) We are grateful to Donald J. Hagerty for providing the following essay: In 1923 the wealthy heiress Anita Baldwin invited Maynard Dixon and his second wife, Dorothea Lange, to accompany her on a trip to the Hopi reservation in Arizona. Baldwin wanted to write an Indian opera and asked Dixon and Lange to come along with her, all expenses paid. But after several weeks, she lost interest in the project and left for Los Angeles. Lange returned with her. Dixon stayed at Walpi, on First Mesa for four months painting and drawing the people, the landscape and their ceremonies despite suffering from bouts of pneumonia. Among the works he produced is Sacred Rock, located on the top of First Mesa and in the center of Walpi. About twenty-two feet tall and nearly freestanding, the rock has played an important part in Hopi religious practices. As geographer James Corner elegantly writes, "like navigation and communication room stacked on the decks of great ships, the Hopi villages probe the expansive sea of desert below and the sky above for clues regarding changes in weather, season, and fortune. The entire Hopi cosmography is constructed with restraint to capture the sacred reality of the landscape and its occupation." In this drawing, Dixon has captured that feel for a religious landscape. HID12401132022 © 2024 Heritage Auctions | All Rights Reserved
