Your Link to Fine Pueblo Pottery
featuring Pueblo Pottery and Storytellers
from Hopi, Navajo, Taos, Jemez, Acoma, Kansas/Kickapoo, Santa Clara,
Isleta, Choctaw and the Village
of Mata Ortiz, Mexico
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Native
American Pottery -
In the Beginning
Pottery, along with basketmaking, is one of the earliest
craft activities of tribal cultures. From Africa to Papua New Guinea,
pots were created for utilitarian purposes. They were used for storage,
cooking and to carry seeds and foods. In Native America, more nomadic
tribes tended to use baskets as their primary carriers and storage vessels
while the pueblo societies, which were settled in place, built pots
for all of these purposes.
With time to create pots of various sizes, Pueblo indians began to add
designs to their creations.
The
earliest designs were thumbprints and corrugations. Later, color clay
slips were used for painted designs of creatures and geometric symbols.
The designs appear to be intended both to honor mythological figures
and game, and to satisfy the human need for beautiful objects.
Susanne & William Ernest Waites,
with a 25-year tradition of quality
in tribal arts, are proprietors of
Native Pottery Link
Native American Pottery - Pueblo Traditions
In time, shards of destroyed prehistoric pots were found
at the site of an early Hopi village, Sikyatki,
by a Hopi woman, Nampeyo, who used the ancient designs in pots
she was creating.
Her
designs were named after the area in which the shards were found. Her
pots began to find great favor,
as have those of her children, grand-children and great grandchildren.
Shortly thereafter, a San Ildefonso Pueblo potter
Maria Martinez, and her husband, Julian, discovered a
firing technique that created a black finish. Nampeyo, Maria
and Julian were among the first to sign their pottery.
Between these two great beginnings a tradition of beautiful signature
Native America pottery was launched.
Works by Nampeyo and her immediate
offsprings are highly collectible today.Work
by Maria Martinez, Julian, their son Popovi Da, daughter-in-law,
Santana, and grandson Tony Da today bring some of the
highest prices paid for pottery.
Several books are available that
detail the famous potting familes of the Southwest pueblos of San Ildefonso,
Santa Clara, San Juan, Jemez, Taos, Pojoaque, Nambe, Santo Domingo,
Isleta, Acoma, Laguna, Zuni and Zia, and the Hopi and Navajo people.
