Art Prices, and Rez Values

As I stood there cleaning the glass showcases, I heard a car drive up in the gravel parking lot outside the trading post. It was still fairly early, 8:15 a.m., and I was in a reflective mood. When the wheels of the car stopped turning and the gravel stopped crunching, I heard the car door creak open. The car was not that old for a Reservation vehicle, ten years or so, but the sound of the door opening told me that it had spent a lot of time on the dusty back roads of southern San Juan County. The sound reminded me of a conversation I had had with a Spanish gentleman last week.

The very nice man and his wife came into the trading post and began to look at the items on display. The wood carvings by Bernie Todacheeny and the pottery of Nancy Chilly and Jackson Yazzie seemed to have caught his attention. After considering the work for a while, he very pleasantly asked, "Why are these things so expensive?" He went on to explain that he had seen how the Navajo people live, and had noticed that they do not have a very high standard of living, generally. Therefore, he could not understand why their work was not much less. He undoubtedly noticed the pained look on my face and elaborated further by saying that he had traveled around the world and seen what he considered work of similar quality at significantly lower prices. The scrunching of my face was not because the comments startled me; I have heard the question and the explanation countless times. No matter how many times the question is asked, I still cannot find a good answer to this extremely complicated issue. "Supply and demand," is usually followed by a very quick exit, and, of course, is neither a satisfactory nor congenial answer .

The car door squeaking open flooded my mind with images of the Navajo and Hopi Reservations and the people I have met and gotten to know over the last thirteen years of running the trading post. In particular, it reminded me how economically difficult things can be. I have spent time at my Hopi friend Stewart Tewa's family home and seen his grandmother living in what, as an outsider, seemed to be abject poverty. The old pueblo home had no running water, the bathroom was outside and the furnishings were sparse indeed. After spending several hours at the house, however, I noticed little things like watermelon and squash under the bed and the happiness of the grandmother and her doting family and realized that the real wealth was there in abundance.

In spite of my knowledge that there are things more important than monetary wealth, I realize how difficult it can be for many of the artists bringing their work to the trading post. We are constantly walking the line between trying to give the artists the best price for their work and meeting the customer's pricing needs; not to mention making a reasonable living for ourselves. Frequently we fall off the line on one side or the other. There is a general perception, as expressed by the Spanish gentleman, that the work taken to produce the traditional crafts should not be valued as highly as other services. It is sometimes difficult for me to understand why a Chicago or New York lawyer is worth $500.00 an hour, when the Navajo weaver or the Amish quilter is worth only $5.00 an hour.

As the local lawyer/trader, I get to see both sides every day. Logically I know that the Chicago lawyer who charges you $500.00 an hour may generate a much larger value in return for the fee. Why, I often ask, do some people not recognize similar value in the art. The happiness it brings us every hour of every day is valuable indeed, much like those watermelon and squash peaking out from under grandmother Tewa's bed or the happiness reflected in the faces of her children and grandchildren.

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