Navajo Horse Basket by Grace Laughter

Description

Size: 15 1/4″ x 2 1/2″

This pictorial basket is woven by Grace Laughter, It incorporates horses surrounding the outer part of the basket with a traditional ceremonial basket design in the center.

The Navajo wedding basket also reflects many values of traditional life and so often contains all six sacred mountains, including Huerfano and Gobernador Knob, though the size of the basket may determine the number of mountains in the design. The center spot in the basket represents the beginning of this world, where the Navajo people emerged from a reed. This is where the spirit of the basket lives. The white part around the center is the earth, the black symbolizing the sacred mountains upon which are found water bowls. Above them are clouds of different colors. The white and black ones represent the making of rain. A red section next to the mountains stands for the sun’s rays that make things grow. (Sacred Land Sacred View, Robert McPherson 1992).