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Lee
& Mary Weebothie-Zuni
Jewelers
Lee and Mary Weebothie are master Zuni silversmiths and inlay artists
from the Zuni Pueblo. Mary unfortunately passed away in 1993. They
both made jewelry since the 1940’s and Lee has said that
they sold to wonderful traders like C.G. Wallace, R. L. Wallace,
Joe Tanner and Dude Kirk. They also sold beautiful jewelry to Don
and Nita Hoel over the years.
Lee was born in 1929 and Mary in 1933. Lee and Mary married in
1949 and started making jewelry together shortly after. Greg Schaf
stated in his book “American indian Jewelry: 1200 Artist
Biographies” that “they were one of the best husband-wife
teams in the history of Zuni jewelry”. Lee did most of the
silver work while Mary was the stone cutter, which she learned
to do from Lee’s mother, Lula. She is known for her master
stone cutting skills which are very unusual because of the rounded
edges on the stones. They both then set the stones. They are very
well know for their interesting cluster work but they also did
other types of work using beautiful high quality stones. They have
won many awards over the years for their beautiful work. |