Special Value Offer: Santa Clara Tan-color Melon Jar [SOLD]

Helen Shupla is best known for her creation of melon jars with ribs pushed from the inside outward.  She made them in black, red, and tan colors of traditional materials.  This one is tan in color.  The melon jar shape has existed since the beginning of the 20th century, or perhaps earlier, but no one brought it to such prominence as did Shupla. She developed her own technique for pushing the melon ribs outward from the inside while she was building the jar with coils of clay. Most potters build the jar, then scrape away some of the clay to form the ribs.

Helen Shupla was of Santa Clara Pueblo and Tohono O'odham tribal heritage.  She was active as a potter from around the mid-1940s until her death in 1985.  Her husband, Kenneth Shupla, was a Hopi katsina doll carver who moved to Santa Clara when he married. In pueblo culture, it is traditional for the husband to move to the wife's village.  Their daughter married Alton Komalestewa, also a Hopi.  He was mentored as a potter by Helen and began making melon jars of her style.

The jar is signed Helen Shupla Santa Clara Pueblo and a paper label attached to the underside designates that the jar was fired on December 9, 1979.  There is a fire cloud on one side but it is not at all distracting.

Provenance: A young (perhaps 10 years old) boy from Santa Fe brought this jar to us to sell for him so that he could buy something that he desperately wants. The jar had been given to him a couple years ago by his grandmother.

Condition: original condition

Recommended Reading: Santa Clara Pottery Today by Betty LeFree (Helen Shupla was one of three potters interviewed in this book)