Pottery of the Pueblo people of the American Southwest
Pueblo pottery are ceramic objects made by the Indigenous Pueblo people and their antecedents, the Ancestral Puebloans and Mogollon cultures in the Southwestern United States and Northern Mexico.[1]
For centuries, pottery has been central to pueblo life as a feature of ceremonial and utilitarian usage. The clay is locally sourced, most frequently handmade (not thrown on a potters wheel nor cast in a mold), and fired traditionally in an earthen pit.[1][2] These items take the form of storage jars, canteens, serving bowls, seed jars, and ladles. Some utility wares were undecorated except from simple corrugations or marks made with a stick or fingernail, however many examples for centuries were painted with abstract or representational motifs. Some pueblos made effigy vessels, fetishes or figurines. During modern times, pueblo pottery was produced specifically as an art form to serve an economic function. This role is not dissimilar to prehistoric times when pottery was traded throughout the Southwest, and in historic times after contact with the Spanish colonialists.[3]
In the 1880s, the arrival of the transcontinental railroad brought anthropologists and ethnographers as well as tourists to the pueblo lands. This resulted in tens of thousands of pottery objects being transferred, sometimes mysteriously, to museums and collectors on the East Coast. Pottery and artifact looting from historical sites began to occur.[4][5][6] At the turn of the century, a modern sensibility began to emerge in the work of a Hopi-Tewa potter, Nampeyo of Hano, and a few years later, in the work of María Martinez from San Ildefonso Pueblo.[7] In the 20th century, pueblo pottery entered the commercial marketplace with its primarily Anglo "middle-men" of gallerists and independent dealers acting as representatives for the artists, who sold these wares to museums and private collectors.[2] This drove up the value of modern and contemporary works, and created a black market for historic and prehistoric objects; even prominent galleries in the 1990s were selling pueblo pottery of questionable provenance. These activities led to stricter enforcement of the Antiquities Act of 1906, the Archaeological Resources Protection Act of 1979 and the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act of 1990.[8][9]
Modern and contemporary pueblo potters tend to work within their family tradition, although some have developed unique styles that break with tradition while remaining cognizant of their ancestry. These artists cite their grandmothers and great-grandmothers as early influences.[10] Currently, there are 21 federally recognized Pueblos in the Southwest, all of which have a range of distinctive styles of pottery produced in the historical colonial period and today. Nineteen pueblos are in New Mexico,[11] one is in Arizona, and one in Texas.[12] Many Puebloans are multi-lingual, speaking Indigenous languages as well and English and Spanish. They never entirely conceded their customs and way of life, and have held fast onto their cultures, languages and religious beliefs and practices.[13] The modern and contemporary Tewa people of Kha'po Owingeh (Santa Clara Pueblo) and P'ohwhóge Owingeh (San Ildefonso Pueblo) favored working in blackware, whereas the Keresan-speaking people of Acoma Pueblo and the Shiwiʼma speaking people of the Pueblo of Zuni work with a wide variety of colors and design motifs.[14][15]
^ abPeckham, Stewart (1990). From This Earth: The Ancient Art of Pueblo Pottery. Santa Fe: Museum of New Mexico Press. ISBN 978-0-89013-204-3.
^ abPeterson, Susan (1997). Pottery by American Indian Women: The Legacy of Generations. New York and Washington, D.C.: Abbeville Press and the National Museum of Women in the Arts. ISBN 0-7892-0353-7.
^Cite error: The named reference Acoma&Laguna-Dillingham was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
^Cite error: The named reference Looting article was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
^Cite error: The named reference Our Pub Lands-looting was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
^Cite error: The named reference TCult was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
^Cite error: The named reference Voices in Clay in STC was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
^Cite error: The named reference SFReporter-looting was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
^Cite error: The named reference Smithsonian Mag - looting was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
^Abaytemarco, Michael (18 August 2017). "Origin Stories: Contemporary Native Potters". Pasatiempo Magazine, Santa Fe New Mexican. Retrieved 29 December 2020.
^"Indian Pueblo Cultural Center". Retrieved 31 December 2020.
^"Indian Entities Recognized and Eligible To Receive Services From the United States Bureau of Indian Affairs" (PDF). United States Department of the Interior. Retrieved 31 December 2020.
^Sando, Joe (19 September 1999). "Pueblo Indians have survived countless struggles". Albuquerque Journal. Retrieved 4 January 2021.
^Furst, Peter T.; Furst, Jill L. (1982). North American Indian Art. New York: Rizzoli. pp. 38–40, 66–71. ISBN 978-0-8478-0461-0.
^Dillingham, Rick (1994). Fourteen families in Pueblo pottery. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press. Retrieved 23 December 2020.
Pueblopottery are ceramic objects made by the Indigenous Pueblo people and their antecedents, the Ancestral Puebloans and Mogollon cultures in the Southwestern...
British Columbia Acoma Pueblo, pottery jar, Field Museum Tesuque Pueblo, Pottery, Field Museum Bird effigy, pottery, Cochiti Pueblo. Field Museum In Native...
Puebloan dwellings Ancestral Puebloans Pueblo Revolt Pueblo music Pueblo architecture PueblopotteryPueblo Lands Act "District IV". Bureau of Indian Affairs...
continued to be used by Pueblo potters, in particular in New Mexico, and other areas of the American Southwest. This pottery is handmade, and potters...
Acoma Pueblo (/ˈækəmə/ AK-ə-mə, Western Keres: Áakʼu) is a Native American pueblo approximately 60 miles (97 km) west of Albuquerque, New Mexico, in the...
pottery. Martinez (born Maria Poveka Montoya), her husband Julian, and other family members, including her son Popovi Da, examined traditional Pueblo...
Spirit of PuebloPottery at the Museum of Indian Arts and Culture in Santa Fe, New Mexico. The exhibition features works of PuebloPottery from the Vilcek...
and repeatedly running through a screen or sieve. Acoma and other Pueblopottery traditionally pound dry clay into a powder and then remove impurities...
- PuebloPottery of the New Mexico Indians. 1977. Schaaf, Gregory - Southern PuebloPottery: 2,000 Artist Biographies. 2003. Aguilar Family pottery at...
adorned. In the northern portion of the Ancestral Pueblo lands, from about 500 to 1300 CE, the pottery styles commonly had black-painted designs on white...
of the Pueblo people. The earliest representations of Avanyu are from 1000 AD. These were found on Mimbres pottery, a precursor to Pueblopottery. In the...
(born 1969) is a Pueblo artist, known for his pottery and fashion design from Cochiti Pueblo, New Mexico. Ortiz makes a variety of pottery, including traditional...
Taos Pueblo, Hopi Pueblos, San Ildefonso Pueblo, Acoma Pueblo and Zuni Pueblo, amongst others. Some of the renowned artists of Pueblopottery include:...
still is used by the Taos and Picuris Pueblos Indians in north-central New Mexico to make pottery. The pottery is made from weathered Precambrian mica...
Light-on-dark color scheme Black-on-white ware, design style employed in Pueblopottery in the Southwest United States Black or White (disambiguation) Black...
processing maize. Communities with low-yield farms traded pottery with other settlements for maize. The Pueblo II Period (Pecos Classification) is roughly similar[how...
dishware. Plain and neckbanded gray pottery was a standard at Pueblo I sites. White pottery with black designs, the pigments coming from plants, and red...
cacao from at least 1,200 miles (1,900 km) away were detected in pottery sherds at Pueblo Bonito. This was the first demonstration that the substance, important...
inhabitants, including Ancestral Pueblopottery, tools and artifacts of daily life. Two life-size dioramas demonstrate Pueblo life in the past and today. Also...
The Pueblo III Period (AD 1150 to AD 1350) was the third period, also called the "Great Pueblo period" when Ancestral Puebloans lived in large cliff-dwelling...
is made of fine local clay found on the pueblo to create the distinctively thin-walled pottery. The pottery is made in white and black and polychrome...