The Collection

The University of Texas at Austin’s Art and Art History Collection (AAHC) has within its holdings 61 textiles arts attributed to Southwestern Native American cultures; among those are 53 Navajo, 3 Hopi, 3 Chimayo, and 2 Pueblo textiles. These textiles derive from 10 different original collectors. The first number of each textile identification/ accession number indicates the collector and the number that follows the hyphen in the ID indicates which object in their collection it is. For example, textile number 2148-582 indicates that F.A Williams donated the textile – his collection being 2148, and -582 indicates that it was the 582nd object to be donated by Williams. Among the Navajo there are 22 blankets, 10 saddle blankets, 7 rugs, 6 shoulder blankets, 3 woven squares, a shawl, a woven bag, a woman’s dress, a blanket/ double saddle blanket, and rug/ blanket. The Hopi holdings consist of a blanket, a woman’s shawl, and a manta. The Chimayo textiles in the collection are all blankets, and the Pueblo consists of a woman’s dress and a rug. However, there are some cases of possible misidentification in terms of the cultures attributed and the type of textile/ garment. These incongruities occur for various reasons, one of which being that the original collectors may not have known the information or have been able to remember the details once they decided to donate their objects. Nevertheless, this collection contains examples of several styles, some of which include Moki (Hopi), Chief, Crystal, Chinle Revival, and Western Puebloan.