PABLITA VELARDE

- PABLITA VELARDE (TSE TSAN) -

Santa Clara Pueblo, 1918-2006

Pablita Velarde, born Tse Tsan (Tewa for "Golden Dawn") on September 19, 1918, at Santa Clara Pueblo near Española, New Mexico, emerged as a pioneering Native American artist renowned for her vivid depictions of Pueblo life and culture. Following the death of her mother when she was about five years old, Velarde and two of her sisters were sent to St. Catherine's Indian School in Santa Fe. At fourteen, she became one of the first female students at Dorothy Dunn's Santa Fe Studio School at the Santa Fe Indian School, where she mastered the "flatstyle" painting technique. This narrative style, which she referred to as "memory paintings," aimed to preserve the rapidly changing Native lifestyles of her time. Early in her studies, she befriended artist Tonita Peña, who significantly influenced her artistic development.

Throughout her career, Velarde's work was showcased in numerous exhibitions across the United States, including solo exhibitions in New Mexico, Florida, and California. Her paintings are held in esteemed collections such as the Bandelier National Monument museum, the Museum of Indian Arts and Culture, the Avery Collection at the Arizona State Museum, the Ruth and Charles Elkus Collection of Native American Art, and the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History. In 1953, she became the first woman to receive the Grand Purchase Award at the Philbrook Museum of Art's Annual Exhibition of Contemporary Indian Painting. The following year, the French government honored her with the Palmes Académiques, recognizing her excellence in art—a distinction she shared with eleven other Native American artists.

Velarde's legacy extends through her family, with her daughter, Helen Hardin, and granddaughter, Margarete Bagshaw, both achieving prominence as artists. In 2012, Bagshaw founded the Pablita Velarde Museum of Indian Women in the Arts in Santa Fe to honor her grandmother's contributions and celebrate other female Native American artists. Although the museum closed in 2015 following Bagshaw's passing, Velarde's impact on Native American art endures. Her dedication to documenting and preserving Pueblo culture through her art has left an indelible mark, inspiring future generations of artists.