Generational Ties
A NEW EXHIBITION AT THE CROCKER ART MUSEUM EXPLORES THE ANCESTRAL CONNECTIONS AND FAMILY HISTORIES THAT HAVE SHAPED PUEBLO POTTERY FROM THE 19TH CENTURY TO PRESENT DAY.
A new exhibition at the Crocker
Art Museum explores the ancestral connections and family histories that have shaped Pueblo pottery from the 19th century to present day.
In the late-19th century, the railroad came to the Southwest. With it, a cottage industry soon emerged, and the area’s Native residents began selling their wares to newcomers. A specific demand for pottery soon catalyzed a change.
The area’s Pueblos had been creating pottery for more than 2,000 years by the time the railroad was laid, and each community had developed its own style of pottery. Different Pueblos created different shapes and designs, and the geographic variations of the clay lent itself to even further distinction.
“There was a period in the 19th century where pottery was functional and ceremonial, but some of the traditions were being lost,” says Scott Shields, associate director and chief curator at the Crocker Art Museum in Sacramento, California. “Then, all of a sudden, there was a market for pottery as art.”
One of the first—and arguably the most renowned—southwestern Pueblo potters to make a name for herself was Nampeyo of Hano (circa 18561942), who sparked a revival of Hopi pottery. She was inspired after seeing imagery on centuries-old artifacts excavated from a village in 1895, and she incorporated those historic designs into her own work.
This innovation left an impression. She was collected widely, and even though she didn’t sign her works, Nampeyo made a name for herself, all the while teaching her craft to others in her village. She passed her knowledge on to her three daughters, who then passed it onto their children, and the revival she began at the turn of the 20th century is still thriving today.
The strength of these family traditions is the subject of an upcoming exhibition at the Crocker Art Museum titled Pueblo Dynasties: Master Potters from Matriarchs to Contemporaries, opening September 15.
The exhibition shows off the progression of the craft, tracing trends and traditions through family lines. Work from over 200 artists are on display, representing five and six generations that began with innovators like Nampeyo, and providing a visual demonstration of how the craft evolved over the 20th and 21st centuries.
“The show really starts with people who thought of themselves as artists,” Shields says. “The destination for this work has always been different. It’s sculptural By Erin E. Rand
and intricate and political, and the roots and the traditions are still there.”
In the 1920s, Maria Martinez (1887-1980) made waves by becoming the first Pueblo potter to consistently sign her work, something that potters in previous generations thought brought too much focus to the individual, rather than the community. She was a trendsetter, and artists signing their pottery soon became the norm. Though she created polychrome pieces at the beginning of her career, Martinez is also responsible for popularizing the black-on-black pottery San Ildefonso potters are so well known for today. Her great-granddaughter Barbara Gonzales is still making blackware pottery, adding her own spin with inset stones and sgraffito.
One of the most prolific family lines of Pueblo potters is the one originating with Sara Fina Tafoya (circa 1863-1949) of Santa Clara. She was one of the first potters to start carving her works, a tradition which was passed down through her children Christina, Camilio and Margaret.
Margaret’s grandson Nathan Youngblood recalls the year he spent living with her, when she told him that he was going to learn to make pottery. “We started by
going to the foothills of Santa Clara Pueblo and dug the pottery clay from the hillside,” he says. The process of making the clay includes several hours of stomping the clay with bare feet. When learning to coil pottery, Youngblood says, “I would sit across my grandmother and try to duplicate her building methods.”
His grandfather, Alcario Tafoya, taught him how to design and carve. “He always reminded me to listen to each piece. The jars, bowls or plates would tell me what designs to draw.”
With the base of knowledge his grandparents taught him, Youngblood mostly stays within the traditional methods with his work. He bases many of his designs off those his grandfather taught him, but he adds, “Over the years I have been influenced by Pacific Rim and Asian designs.”
He’s also made some adjustments. His grandmother would often fire 30 or 40 pots at a time, but the steel grates placed between the pots would sometimes slip around during the firing process and cause imperfections. Because of this, Youngblood fires the vast majority of his work one at a time.
Shields notes how the contemporary artists are honing the motifs from a hundred years ago, but they’re also introducing new ideas. “Some have gone political over time, or based their imagery on Pop Art and street art…it’s interesting to see how contemporary artists are putting their own spin on it, and how refined the work has become,” he says.
At the age of 4, Roxanne Swentzell began making figurines out of her mother’s clay— she created hundreds before she’d even finished grade school and says, “They became my first language.”
Learning from her mother,
Rina Swentzell, and
grandmother, Rose Naranjo, she developed her own style, incorporating the methods of her ancestors with her personal vision and modern clay techniques.
This innovation was encouraged by her mother, who learned to use modern technology like kilns and glazes with her work. “She put the two worlds together, as she would still go dig most of all her clay and even glazes from the landscape,” Swentzell says. “When she would see what looked like a good clay on the side of the road she would tell us to give her our socks to fill with dry clays to be taken home and tested. I still love to try different clays in this way knowing our Mother gives many clay—some for making pretty pots, some for making pots for cooking in, other clays for glazes and oxides and still other clays for making sculptures with.” Now, Swentzell sees the clay sculptures she creates as timeless even though they are categorized as contemporary. “Their messages are about the human condition in emotional expressive gestures that all races and ages are capable of relating to,” she says.
Santa Clara potter (and Swentzell’s cousin) Jody Naranjo still makes pottery in the same way her mother and grandmother did, including digging her clay from the same pits. “Our polishing stones are passed down from generation to generation,” she says. The main difference in her work from the work of her ancestors is mainly in aesthetics, and Naranjo explains, “I consider them to be Pueblo designs, but they have a more contemporary or modern touch.”
One of her pots is called Too Much Estrogen, which she created more than a decade ago. “I had three young daughters and felt a bit overwhelmed,” she said of the pot, which contains imagery of girls and young women. “They’ve grown up now.”
Pueblo Dynasties will showcase the families together, using vines to help visualize how the generations intertwine, and also see how the art evolves in terms of scale, execution and complexity. “There’s a lot to learn in this room,” says Shields. “I was overwhelmed by the immensity of it all, how they relate to each other. Once you realize that, it’s so much more meaningful.”