Squash Blossom silver and turquoise necklace - Lot 66

Squash Blossom silver and turquoise necklace Navajo (Diné), Arizona H. 66 cm - Gross weight: 296.71 g Presumed date of manufacture: late 19th or early 20th century Provenance : - Andy Warhol Collection, New York - Sotheby's New York, "American Indian Art - Andy Warhol Collection", April 28, 1988, lot 2385 - Private collection - Delorme & Collin du Bocage, "Parures de l'Antiquité à nos jours Vol. II", March 3, 2015, lot - French collection, acquired at the above sale Superb early example of a squash blossom necklace of Navajo (Diné) origin, consisting of 17 high-quality turquoise stones set on a finely worked silver frame. As noted by the Maxwell Museum of Anthropology, University of New Mexico, the origin of squash blossom necklaces remains uncertain, but the earliest examples are thought to have been created in the late 19th century by artists native to the American Southwest. Today, they are one of the most emblematic forms of Native American jewelry. Squash blossom beads resemble the blossoms of squash plants, an essential food crop for the region's Amerindian peoples. These ornaments were signs of wealth and status throughout the Pueblo region. The central semi-cicular motif, or naja, the Navajo term for crescent, forms the centerpiece of the necklace. This motif is thought to be of North African or Moorish inspiration, introduced to the American Southwest by the Spanish conquistadors as early as the 16th century. Another theory attributes its introduction to the Plains peoples, with whom the Navajos (or Diné) were in commercial contact. The Navajos were the first to use this motif, before it spread rapidly to other peoples of the region. The first squash blossom necklaces were made from melted Spanish and American coins. Provenance: Andy Warhol Collection (1928-1987). A central figure in Pop Art and a great lover of non-European art, Warhol was passionately interested in Native American cultures. His last major series, Cowboys and Indians (1986), produced shortly before his death, paid tribute to the great Indian chiefs and to the objects Warhol collected, including Kachina dolls and Plains war ornaments.