We learn all about kokopelli

In our ever-widening search for appropriate art for the southwest clubhouse, we've been confronted regularly by a curious image. A humpbacked flutist. You see it in people's yards, garages, on switchplates, truck bodies, everywhere. Galleries stock them beside their sunshines, cacti, rugs and pots. Old business to them, it was new to us.

Friday we went to Tubac, Arizona, home to a community of artists, just north of the Mexico border. They were having and art festival so it was just the place to ask. We found a Native American artist (see bottom photo) who sounded quite knowledgeable about the little image of the humpbacked flute player. He said they were Kokopelli and then, not impolitely but with some resignation, handed us something to read -- he's apparently been quizzed by tourists before. Here's essentially what we learned, taken from an internet search:

Kokopelli is a prehistoric deity depicted hundreds of times in rock art, some of it over a thousand years old, located in numerous sites in southwestern United States deserts and mountains. Often depicted as a humpbacked flute player, this mythic being has survived in recognizable form from Anasazi times to the present. There is something appealing about Kokopelli which fascinates all kinds of people, even in our modern technological age.

The Anasazi or "Ancient Ones" were primarily farmers, growing corn, beans, and squash in the Four Corners area on the Colorado Plateau. Both the Basketmaker Period (dating at least from about 200 B.C.) and the Pueblo Period (dating from about 700 A.D.) include the humpbacked flute player among their deities or supernaturals.

Long-distance trade networks and migrations from Mexico apparently helped spread cultural and religious elements, so that by 1500 A.D. fluteplayer images were also included in the Hohokam, Mogollon, and Fremont cultures, in petroglyphs (rock carving), pictographs (rock painting), kiva murals, ceramics and baskets. Today, Kokopelli is one of the Hopi kachinas, and is in many traditional stories and songs of Native Americans of the desert southwest.

In Kokopelli, Flute Player Images in Rock Art, Dennis Slifer and James Duffield mention "...widely held beliefs that Kokopelli was a fertility symbol, roving minstrel or trader, rain priest, hunting magician, trickster, and seducer of maidens..."

"In Pueblo myths, Kokopelli carries in his hump seeds, babies, and blankets to offer to maidens that he seduces. In upper Rio Grande pueblos, he wandered between villages with bags of songs on his back. As a fertility symbol, he was welcome during corn-planting season and was sought after by barren wives, although avoided by shy maidens."


There you have it, folks. Kokopelli. Authentic to the Southwest. We haven't purchased anything yet. Got my eye on an arc-welded handmade kokopelli mobile made from reused auto and wash machine parts that would be perfect for planting next to the prickly pear in the front yard, but haven't pulled the trigger. Shiny now, it should eventually rust down to a fine copper patina. Under $100. Got to run it by the board first.

Our Kokopelli mentor, above right, was very helpful, but probably more interested in the novel he was reading than educating innocents from the North. The other photo depicts a live performance by a native American flutist. The music was hauntingly beautiful and set a tone for the afternoon. Meanwhile, Kathleen and Hoover admire a $4000 woodcarving of a southwest landscape -- perfect for the big clubhouse wall.