Diné (Navajo) Gourd-shape Pottery Vessel [SOLD]

Christine Nofchissey McHorse is an innovative potter who successfully combines the techniques and materials of traditional pottery with contemporary non-traditional forms and firing methods. She uses micaceous clay taken from the mountains near Taos to hand-build her vessels using the coil method.

Christine is Diné. She married into the Taos Pueblo heritage where she was introduced to the mica-speckled clay by her husband's grandmother, Lena Archuleta, who had a curio shop in Taos. Her first formal training began at the Institute of American Indian Arts, which she attended beginning at age 13, when the institute was still a high school. Today, Christine's work reveals an ingenious combination of innovation and tradition, typical of the finest Navajo crafts.

Christine achieves beauty through simplicity of design. Beauty and simplicity of form are the basis for her work. This vessel is evidence of her achievements.  It is beautifully shaped, formed in the likeness of a gourd.  The vessel was formed in the traditional pueblo fashion of coiling but was covered in piñon pitch in the traditional Navajo fashion.  It has a beautiful brown color with mica flakes sparkling over the entire vessel.  There are a couple of beautiful fire clouds on one side of the body.

The neck of the gourd is designed with a zigzag line on one side of the opening and raised short lines in two rows on the opposite side of the opening.  The vessel is signed on the underside CMcHorse but is not dated, however, it was awarded a second award at the Santa Fe Indian Market in 1987 so that is the year it was made.

Condition: original condition

Provenance: from the collection of a family from California