Acoma Pueblo Small Polychrome Pottery Jar by Matriarch Lucy Lewis [SOLD]

This small traditional polychrome pottery jar, made by Acoma Pueblo matriarch Lucy Lewis, features designs related to water, particularly to rain.  The orange triangles outlined in dark brown pigment, have falling rain at their juncture and dark clouds at their sides.  The dark brown designs that fill a quarter of the vessel body are, once again, related to rain as indicated by the brown parallel vertical lines.

Lucy Lewis was one of the most widely respected potters from her pueblo. She was one of the last Acoma matriarchs to live full-time at the Pueblo. She followed pueblo tradition in every step of pottery production—offering prayers of thanks to Mother Earth for the clay, taking only as much clay as she needed, working the clay with only her hands, forming the vessel from coils of clay, scraping the walls with tools fashioned from gourds, painting the vessel with slips and paints made from clay and vegetal sources and, finally, firing the finished pieces in an outdoor handmade kiln. Lucy signed her pottery as Lucy M. Lewis.

Lucy Martin Lewis was born in 1898 and passed away on March 12, 1992 at a supposed age of 93. Her year of birth is not accurately known. She spent nearly all her life atop the high mesa of Acoma Pueblo, making pottery since the age of 7. She is largely responsible for the revival of Mimbres black-on-white pottery designs which are more than 1,000 years old. She was famous, as well, for her exquisite polychrome designs and her fine-line and lightning designs.

Condition: very good condition with minor spalling spots and very faint fire clouds

Provenance: this Acoma Pueblo Small Polychrome Pottery Jar by Matriarch Lucy Lewis is from the extensive collection of a Santa Fe resident

Recommended Reading: LUCY M. LEWIS American Indian Potter by Susan Peterson 

Relative Links: Acoma Pueblo, Pueblo Pottery, Lucy Martin Lewis