Hopi Kachina dolls | In and around the Surrealist Collections | Andre Breton / Max Ernst
André Breton and his Kachina dolls
Andre Breton, started collecting Kachinas in 1927 and established their place in the art world when he featured a Kachina on the poster for an exhibition of Surrealist objects in Paris in 1936. Many artists soon wished, in Breton’s words, to “accede” to a newly discovered system of knowledge and cultural relationships: Max Ernst, Marcel Duchamp, Roberto Matta, Jorge Camacho and Harold and Louise Corbusier all owned Kachinas.
Andre Breton’s apartment at 42, rue Fontaine, Paris
Hopi , Arizona Qötsa Nata’aska Katsina, 1910 / Zuni, New Mexico, Katsina, 1910-30
Andre Breton’s apartment at 42, rue Fontaine, Paris
Max Ernst with his collection of Kachina dolls on the terrace of Peggy Guggenheim’s brownstone, NYC 1942
Max Ernst and his kachina dolls collection, spring 1942
Man Ray, Kachina Dolls, 1945
Max Ernst, New York, NY, 1942 / Katsina Doll
Edward Sheriff Curtis, Kachina dolls, 1922
Three Hopi Indian kachina dolls, ca.1900
Kachina dolls
“They are the most beautiful things in the world…”
Paul Éluard described kachina dolls in “Letters to Gala” (1927)
Andy Warhol, Kachina Dolls 381, 1986
Kachina dolls represent spirits or gods from the pantheon of the Pueblo peoples in the American Southwest. Given to children, they constituted a pedagogical tool allowing them to familiarize themselves with the spiritual world and perpetuating knowledge of the founding myths on which their society was based.
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