Quanita Kalestewa Zuni Heartline Deer Polychrome Jar [SOLD]

This Zuni Pueblo pottery jar has a lovely shape and a mixture of original and traditional design elements.  The artist decorated it in sections, beginning with a cream slip throughout.  The base has been painted dark brown and two central bands of pictorials rise above it.  The main body is painted with a repeating motif of a heartline deer inside of what appears to be an abstract nature scene.  Dark brown lines curve to frame the deer and triangles and half circles ornament each side of this frame.  This pattern is repeated on each of four sides of the vessel.  

Above the mid-band another band of patterns sits juxtaposed to the one below it, for instead of pictorials of animals and familiar shapes, it is very abstract and geometric in nature.  Repeated in fours around the jar and atop the deer are triangles and rectangles, each painstakingly decorated with fine stripes in red and dark brown, and a basket weave of dark brown on the tip of the triangle.  This pattern is framed on each side by an unbreaking dark brown line just below the cream of the jar’s rim, which has been topped with dark brown. 

Quanita Kalestewa (Juanita Kalestewa), Zuni Pueblo, specializes in traditional polychrome jars, cornmeal bowls, effigy pots, frog pots, owls, storytellers, jewelry, and carvings. Quanita Kalestewa is the daughter of Nellie Bica; wife of Jack Kalestewa; mother of Erma Jean Homer, Roweena Lention, and Connie Yatsayte.

Quanita Kalestewa (1932-) watched her mother, Nellie Bica, make pottery; However, Quanita did not get personally involved in pottery until the 1940s.

Quanita and her husband, Jack Kalestewa, began by making jewelry. They later turned to pottery making because of the high price of silver, as well as health concerns over breathing dust from grinding shells. They collect clay at Nutria Mesa. Their red paint is made from yellow ochre (limonite). They form their pottery in a trailer behind their home. The Kalestewa family continues to fire pottery traditionally with sheep manure outdoors. They also are known for making very thin-walled pottery.

Condition: this Zuni jar is in very good condition 

Provenance: this Quanita Kalestewa Zuni Heartline Deer Polychrome Jar is from the personal collection of a family who reside in New Mexico. 

Recommend Reading: Dialogues with Zuni Potters by Milford Nahohai & Elisa Phelps

Relative Links: Zuni Pueblo, Nellie Bica, Southwest Indian Pottery, Quanita Kalestewa