Treasure Trove

Bonnie Gangelhoff; Photos by Michael Garland

An array of Native American art finds a home in Southern California.

THE EAGLE’S FAMILY ROOM FEATURES A TONY ABEYTA PAINTING IN A BUILT-IN DISPLAY CASE AND A POT BY PAHPONEE ON THE TABLE

Mike Eagle still remembers when he and his wife, Juanita, purchased their first piece of Native American art. It was 1980 and they were driving through the Black Hills of South Dakota on their way home to Michigan after a summer vacation in California. They stopped for a break and wandered into a shop where a beautifully carved Hopi doll caught their eye. The Eagles bought the piece for $300, never dreaming that one day their home would be graced with an extensive and stellar collection of Native American art. “We didn’t think about collecting art then,” says Eagle. “We didn’t buy another piece for five years.”

At first, the Hopi dancing figure landed in their daughter Melodie’s doll collection. Today the piece sits on a shelf in the “kachina room” of the couple’s sprawling home in Rancho Santa Fe, just north of San Diego. It is one of the many pieces in a dazzling array of Native American pottery, paintings, kachinas, and sculptures the couple has amassed over the past 28 years since that first serendipitous purchase.

In some ways, a curator would consider the Eagles’ collection “deep” because it is dominated by a handful of artists, such as Pahponee, a Kickapoo potter; Tony Abeyta, a Navajo painter; and Tammy Garcia, a potter and sculptor from Santa Clara Pueblo. But in addition to this talented trio of award-winning artists, the Eagles also have works by about 100 more contemporary Native artists.

“A lot of people collect older pieces, but what we like are pieces by living artists,” Eagle says. “We have watched these artists evolve, get better and better, and try new things. More than once we have teased them that we wished they would stop doing new things.” But the truth is, what appeals to these particular California collectors is artists who are adventuresome, innovative, and open to trying something different.

The Eagles are fond of saying they have been on a journey over the years, educating themselves about Native American art, meeting artists, visiting studios, and attending major shows across the country. But it wasn’t until five years after they purchased their first piece that they were bitten by the collecting bug. Melodie, then in fourth grade, came home from a class trip to Navajo and Hopi reservations bearing a small Santa Clara black pot, which she had purchased for $18. The young girl was thrilled with her find and showed an immediate interest in Native American culture, an interest her parents encouraged.

A BRONZE SCULPTURE BY TAMMY GARCIA AND A PAINTING BY FRANK HOWELL GREET VISITORS IN THE FOYER

To further nurture her passion, the family vacationed in the Southwest the following year, visiting Hopi and Navajo reservations in Arizona and a Zuni reservation in New Mexico. Almost every year since then, the Eagles made a point of traveling to this part of the country as their interests in Native American cultures grew and flourished. In August 1989, they attended the annual Santa Fe Indian Market, which quickly became a family tradition. The Eagles go back every year, though these days friends join in and the group expands to as many as 15 people.

 “The first time you go to Indian Market, it’s almost overwhelming. There are 600 booths and twice that number of artists. All the galleries have openings. It’s mind-boggling,” Eagle says. “But there is also an incredible enthusiasm and energy that makes us to go back.”

In the beginning, the Eagles didn’t know which galleries to visit to find Native works. They gradually discovered Gallery 10 in Santa Fe, which is now closed. In more recent years, they have found many pieces at Blue Rain Gallery, also in Santa Fe. Their daughter, now grown, and her husband also collect Native American art and enthusiastically join in the trips to Santa Fe.

Over the course of his career, Eagle, a semi-retired executive in the auto, medical, and pharmaceutical industries, moved the family to Detroit, Atlanta, San Jose, and Indianapolis. In Indianapolis, he sat on the board of the Eiteljorg Museum of American Indians and Western Art, where he served for 12 years. When he joined the board, he and his wife had been collecting Native American art for a decade. But, he says, they still had much to learn. In addition to gaining an understanding about how shows are curated and how art is preserved, they also learned the meaning of “museum-quality work.” “The museum gets a lot of opportunities to collect works, but not all of the art is worthy of being displayed in a museum,” Eagle says.