Hosteen Klah was a remarkable Navajo artist who defied traditional gender roles. They were recognized as having Nádleehi, embodying both traditionally male and female roles. Hosteen Klah served as a medicine man (a traditionally male role) and a weaver (a traditionally female role). Their legacy includes the preservation of Navajo religious traditions, when they co-founded the Navajo Museum of Ceremonial Art in Sante Fe, New Mexico with Boston philanthropist Mary Cabot Wheelwright. Now called the Wheelwright Museum of the American Indian, it is home to most of Klah’s sand painting weavings, as well as their drawings, songs, stories and their tribe’s sacred objects and ceremonies Klah continues to inspire and challenge societal norms.
“Beauty in front of me
Behind me
All around me
I speak through beauty”
(Navajo Healer – Hosteen Klah by Annie Kahn, Navajo poet)
(Please note: the bio uses the pronouns “they” and “their,” which properly refer to Klah’s non-binary gender)
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