Pop Chalee! Yippee Ki Yay!

In the late 1930s, Chalee began her artistic career in her late twenties through training in design and flat-style painting at The Studio at the Santa Fe Indian School, under her teacher Dorothy Dunn’s direction. During these years, Walt Disney visited the Native American artists at the school and purchased Chalee’s work, which likely inspired his forest animation style in forthcoming years. By 1939, Chalee participated in both the New York World’s Fair and the Golden Gate International Exposition in San Francisco. By the late 1940s, the Santa Fe Railway commissioned her to create a mural, Shalakos and Mudheads. Other existing murals of Chalee’s are in Albuquerque, inside the Sunport Airport and at the storefront of 510 Central Avenue SW, the former location of Maisel’s Trading Post. In 1950, Chalee, with Navajo husband Edward Lee Natay, traveled to more than 20 American states to promote the motion picture, Annie Get Your Gun (1950), in a publicity tour.
Much gratitude to Kathleen Cornbringer Michaels and Jack Cruz Hopkins Jr., Chalee’s grandson, who curated this exhibition to commemorate Chalee’s induction into the National Cowgirl Hall of Fame. As Hopkins says, “On horseback, Grandmother was the best rider. She could outride most men.” The Millicent Rogers Museum graciously honors Chalee’s legacy.
September 12, 2021 - May 15, 2022 in Galleries 13 + 15

