Artist:Preston Ami
Medium: Cottonwood root, pigment
Geograhical Locations:
Dates:ca. 1990
Dimensions: 7 x 2 3/8 x 3 1/2 in. (17.8 x 6 x 8.9 cm)
Collections:
Exhibitions:
Accession Number: 2013.64.12
Catalogue Description: Mouse figure depicted as a warrior, carrying a bow, a rattle and satchel on his back. Not really a kachina but honored as such. Story is that a chicken hawk was killing off all the chickens in the village. He was too fast and too clever for all the men to catch. The animals decided to do something but no one volunteered until a little mouse said he would. He took two sticks, one straight and pointed and the other with a Y in it and set it as if a tripod in the grass. Then he climbed on a rock and sang silly songs challenging the hawk. Seeing this he bird flew down fast, diving faster and faster and at the last minute the mouse jumped away and the hawk was impaled on the stick in the grass. Since then the Hopi People have added the little mouse as a kachina.