This book is about how beauty calls to us, about the power of beauty, and specifically about how that power is expressed in masterworks by the Hopi artist Nampeyo, whose life spanned ca. 1860 to 1942.  It sketches a picture of the changing American West that was backdrop to that era, Hopi cultural ways, and the development of Nampeyo's art from her early youth through the apex
of her mastery. We wish to look closely at how she saw and interpreted her world, her technical innovations, and her work within the context of a broader Pueblo communicative expressiveness.
An archaeologist assembles the broken shards of past cultures with an eye towards deciphering ancient lifeways. The humanist excavates the human condition and deep psyche trying to understar why we do what we do. Our existence, though fleeting, leaves imprints, echoes, and artifacts within the history that we occupied, and, occasionally, beauty that continues to speak of a personality expressive in its own unique vision. Today, more than four generations of potters later, the original designs and compositions of Nampeyo are still being finessed by her descendants and others.
Such beauty calls to us from across time and space. Nampeyo created an aesthetic, intellectual, and
emotive portal into the core of Hopi experience, but also into the transcultural experience of beauty.
We have been privileged to hear its call.