“New Butterfly”

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Her body is in the shape of a gourd, the oldest utilitarian vessel known to mankind. The gourd is used as storage, to carry water, women use to shape pottery and as a rattle in ceremonies. The flat plane that runs down the middle of her body represents the womb. In all aspects of Hopi the perpetuation of life is stressed. The Hopi people are matriarchal society, where a child’s lineage comes from the mother. In traditional Hopi culture the women own the home, all of the household materials as well as the seeds planted every spring.

In her hair is a Tableta, a headdress that represents the clouds, lightning and rain. The Butterfly dance is a social dance in which young women are allowed to participate and which honors the renewal of life.

She has no face for she symbolizes the egalitarian society of the Hopi people, not an individual. The Hopi thought is: One Mind, one Body, one Spirit.