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Pipe Bowl

ca. 1875
Not on view
Returned to lender
This work of art was on loan to the museum and has since been returned to its lender.
This sculpture portrays the buffalo as a symbol of continued life and procreative power. It also celebrates the animal’s physical strength. Rooted to the ground over the form of a ridged phallus, the monumental bull looks straight ahead with nostrils flaring, a stance of might and potency. Plains people considered the buffalo a sacred relative. The near extinction of the herds by 1881, through Euro-American commercial hunting, threatened the physical and cultural survival of Native peoples.

Artwork Details

Object Information
  • Title: Pipe Bowl
  • Date: ca. 1875
  • Geography: United States, Wyoming or Oklahoma
  • Culture: Cheyenne
  • Medium: Stone
  • Dimensions: Length: 10 in. (25.4 cm)
    Width: 1 1/8 in. (2.9 cm)
  • Classification: Stone-Implements
  • Credit Line: Denver Art Museum (1948.263a)
  • Curatorial Department: The Michael C. Rockefeller Wing