The pre-1900s vessels from Ohkay Owingeh were not as highly polished as today's blackware from the other Tewa pueblos, but the lack of severe polishing provided slight irregularities in the surface of a vessel from which the reflected light is pleasantly muted.  Most vessels were slipped with a deep red slip on the upper 2/3rd of the body, leaving the lower 1/3rd without slip.  The entire vessel was then polished, inside and out, to a hard finish.  The red-over-tan finished product was then fired-either in an oxidizing or reduction firing-from which would be obtained a red-over-tan or black-over gray finished product.

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Cochiti Pueblo residents speak the Keresan language, along with their Northeast Keres neighbors, Kewa and San Felipe. The three pueblos are strongly religious in both the Roman Catholic and their own Native religion. Their association with non-native peoples is not as homogenous, however. Kewa is more conservative in protecting its beliefs and lifestyle that either Cochiti or San Felipe. Cochiti is more open about painting religious symbolism on secular pots whereas Kewa would not do so. San Felipe is located closer to Interstate 25 than Cochiti and operates a casino open to the public.
Cochiti Pueblo has been in its present location since before 1700. Its current population is around 1500. It has a long history of producing beautiful pottery for use at the pueblo and for producing large quantities of figurine pottery for sale to merchants in Santa Fe. The potters seem to be better known for the figurine pottery than for vessel-shape pottery, but the latter has always been produced for pueblo use as well as for sale.

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Mark Tahbo's great-grandmother was Grace Chapella and his grandmother was Alma Chapella Tahbo.  Mark remembers Grace because she encouraged him to work with clay when he was a youngster.  Mark was around 22 years old when Grace passed away at the age of 107 years.  Mark reminisced about Grace when he brought us this jar.  He said that when she was about 104 years she made a jar about the size of this one he brought us and it was the largest jar she had made in years and years, so her daughter, Alma hid it from Grace so she would not break it or ruin it by painting the design.  Grace searched and searched for the jar and finally found it hidden behind a door in a stove.  She took it out and held it while sitting in a chair and fell asleep with it in her lap.  Of course, it fell to the floor and broke in many pieces.  She awoke and said that Alma is going to be very angry at her, which, of course, was the case. 

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This polychrome olla qualifies as an exceptional work of art. The vessel shape is as near perfect as one would expect. The high shoulder provided room for a large area on the main body for the artist to express her artistic talent.

As is traditional at Acoma, the jar was formed in native clay with ground pottery shard temper, has a rag-wiped white slip, red neck interior, and red-slipped underbody with concave base. The point of maximum diameter is as near the equator of the jar as one could calculate.

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The high shoulder of this historic  jar is emphasized by the split horizontal bars that are stacked on each other.  The strong black of this design contrasts significantly with the polychrome designs on the neck and body of the Acoma Pueblo jar.

The neck design contains the same design elements as those on the body, just reduced in size to fit the smaller area.  The design panels are divided by triangles alternating in an up and down position.  In each triangle there is a white and black design in a horizontal rectangle.  On one side of that is a design of fine black parallel lines and on the other side is a block of orange. This design within a triangle is repeated throughout the body and neck.

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Dorothy Loretto Trujillo, who passed away in 1999, was an outstanding potter. She was originally from Jemez Pueblo, but moved to Cochiti following her marriage to Onofre Trujillo, and obtained permission to make pottery using Cochiti clay.  After moving to Cochiti Pueblo, Dorothy started making pottery in the Cochiti style, abandoning her Jemez style.

Dorothy was one of the early potters to make storytellers.  She was from a family of outstanding potters. Her sisters, Mary E. Toya, Marie Edna Coriz, Alma Concha Loretto, Fannie Wall Loretto, and Lenora Lupe Lucero, are famous potters as well.  Interestingly, her sisters also married out of their native pueblo and moved to the pueblo of their spouses.  Dorothy began making Storytellers before 1970. Two years later, she began making Nativities (Nacimientos). Dorothy shared her pottery-making knowledge with others. She had taught at least three people, including two of her own daughters. Her Storytellers may have only one or over 40 babies. One of her Storytellers is on exhibit at the Smithsonian Institution, Museum of Natural History, Washington, D.C.

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The Akimel O´odham River People (Pima) of Arizona were major basket makers in the late 19th century, primarily making them for their own use.  At the turn of the century, basket weaving was being practiced in every home.  This continued into the early 20th century, at which time Southwest Indian basketry became a collectible commodity.  The problem was that the collectors and dealers only paid $1.00 to $3.00 for a basket.  The women soon realized that it was not practical to spend weeks making a basket when they could pick cotton and earn $2.00 a day.  By the 1920s, basket weaving all but disappeared.  By 1960, they were not even making baskets for their own use.  They had, by then, substituted commercially made pots and pans for utilitarian use.

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Mark Tahbo often uses historic and prehistoric examples of Hopi pottery as his inspiration when creating designs on new vessels.  He, by doing this, keeps the continuity of Hopi ceramics alive and brings the older designs back to the attention of today's collectors.

This medium-size jar was inspired by a Hopi Polacca Polychrome jar (Sikyatki Revival), dating from 1890-1900, that was in the Thomas Keam collection and now resides at the Peabody Museum at Harvard University.  At the time that Alexander M. Stephen cataloged the Keam collection, he categorized Polacca Polychrome as "modern" pottery because it was being made at the time he was working with Keam on documenting his collection.  Modern pottery of that time (1890-1900) is now considered historic pottery.

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Gwen Sharon Setalla (b.1964-) Aȁs-kữ-Mana is a Hopi from the village of Mishongnovi on Second Mesa.  Her mother is Pauline Setalla from Mishongnovi.  They are of the Frog Woman and Feather Woman families.  The family lived on a ranch not far from Keams Canyon and Gwen spent her early childhood there.  She learned pottery making from her mother, starting as early as age 5 and began to take it seriously by age 21. 

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This very large Hopi Pueblo seed jar was made by Debbie Clashin, a potter we met through Hopi potter Mark Tahbo.  Mark's mother and Debbie's mother were sisters.  Debbie credits Mark's sister, Diana Tahbo, with teaching her how to become a potter and now Debbie produces amazing large Hopi seed jars.  This jar is over a foot in diameter. 

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Like almost every artist who has visited New Mexico, Edward Borein (1873-1945) provides us with his rendition of Taos Pueblo.  A Taos woman tends to her bread that is baking in the horno, a Taos Indian is climbing a ladder to get to the second level of the terrace house, a couple of people are walking, one is standing in a doorway on the right, and a horse is standing near a building.  

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Edward Borein was born at San Leandro, California, not far from San Francisco, in 1873.  He began to work as a cowboy at the age of seventeen, and sold his first drawing when he was twenty-one.  From that time onward, irrespective of location as he travelled all over the Southwestern United States and as far south as Guatemala, he was an artist.  He remained ever devoted to the practice of his professional skill, and at the same time kept up his interest in cowboy life, to the very end.

Borein also knew the Pueblo Indians and drew them and their villages.  It is not known what years Borein visited the Pueblo villages and put his thoughts on paper in the etching process but it would have been in the late 1800s or early 1900s. 

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Gerald Nailor (1917-1952) painted in a decorative manner unlike any other Navajo artist.  His style was unique and quite recognizable.  He generally painted in soft matte colors.

"In 1937, Nailor shared a studio in Santa Fe with Allan Houser. His paintings were exhibited in the home of Mrs. Hall Adams from 1943 to 1952. At the time of his death, he was living with his family at Picuris Pueblo, NM. Tragically, Nailor was only 35 years old when [he] died from injuries received in an attempt to help a woman whose husband was brutally beating her." -Snodgrass, 1968.

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Mark Tahbo, great-grandson of Hopi-Tewa potter Grace Chapella, was inspired by the two previous jars and created his version of the same.  It is not a copy of the two previous jars, but a jar inspired by those. The mythological bird-like figures are similar, but different, with the same elements previously described by Alexander Stephen for the Sikyatki jar.  So, there is a Sikyatki pre-historic jar, a later Polacca Polychrome follow-up jar, and now a contemporary Hopi jar to continue the Hopi mythology of the Thunder bird.  Mark Tahbo used Sikyatki clay for this new jar. 

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Peter Shelton ( - ) Hoyesva - Wherever the Arrow Lands was born in the Hopi Pueblo village of Oraibi, where he received his early education.  He was also educated at the Santa Fe Indian School.  Though usually recognized as a painter, Shelton was also a carver of Katsina dolls.  That he took a keen interest in Katsina dolls is evident even in his paintings. The dancers featured in his paintings are often depicted in stances like those of Kachina dolls.  They are tall and slender, and are often decorated with a variety of bright colors.  Particular attention is given to the Katsinas' ceremonial clothing. 

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Zuni artisans are praised for their masterful lapidary work.  They have achieved the ultimate in cutting stones so that they fit together in a stone-to-stone manner as tightly as the Inca set massive stones together without the use of mortar.  This Zuni Pueblo Multi-Stone Butterfly Pin, circa 1920, is an excellent example of such fine work.  Each stone fits the adjoining stone beautifully. 

Navajo artist Robert Draper was the child of a Navajo mother and a Hopi-Laguna father.  Raised by his grandparents on the Navajo Reservation, he attended-and eventually became an instructor at- the Chinle Boarding School.  He was also educated at the Inter-Mountain Indian School in Utah and the Institute of America Indian Arts in Santa Fe.  Draper mostly painted realistic landscapes, focusing on everyday life on the Navajo Reservation. 

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Tesuque Pueblo painter Tim Vigil ( - ) Ku Se Peen - Rocky Mountain was the son of Thomas Vigil, one of the earliest 20th century Pueblo painters, and the brother of Paul Vigil.  Thomas Vigil worked almost exclusively within the confines of the two-dimensional "flat-style" of painting for which he and his peers are well-known today, and the few available published examples of Tim and Paul's work are also in keeping with this traditional style. 

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Danny Russell Kaler is an enrolled member of the Muskogee Creek Nation.  There is very little information published on the artist but it is documented that his work has been exhibited at the Cherokee National Museum; the Five Civilized Tribes Museum; and the Philbrook Art Center.  He received awards from the Five Civilized Tribes Museum in 1971, 1972, 1973 and 1985, the latter two being 1st Prizes.

This painting of a single Buffalo Dancer is dated 1976.  It is painted without ground plane or other distracting items such as trees or clouds. 

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"The Grandfather of the Navajo Kachina is one of the more enjoyable features of the Navajo Kachina Dance. He does not speak but pantomimes whatever he wants.  He starts the dance, acting as a leader in both singing and dancing.  His dance step is an exaggeration, and a very lively one, that may be interspersed with a comic action such as the request for food-mountains of food.  All of these requests are done in pantomimes that bring laughter to the audience." Wright 1973

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