Polly Rose Fowell

Polly Rose Folwell won the 2003 Best of Pottery award at the annual Heard Museum Guild Indian Fair & Market. "Winning this award," Folwell exclaims, "was the most exciting thing that ever happened to me." Her prize-winning creation was a technical masterpiece of contemporary pottery that uniquely portrayed a powerful theme-the tragedy of 9-11. In bold sgrafitto carving, she depicted the split second before the planes crashed into the World Trade Center. The visual impact of the pot first evoked awe, then animated conversation among the crowds of viewers. Heard fair judge David Revere McFadden commented, "A hundred years from now, this pot will continue to be important to history."

Folwell, a single mother, daily demonstrates her courage and creativity as a full-time artist. She makes pots with her daughter, Kaa, who at the age of 12 already displays great potential. After years of hard, determined work, Folwell is now finding a measure of success. Some of this can be attributed to the loving support of her friends and a family that includes many renowned potters. In fact, Folwell is a sixth-generation Santa Clara potter.

Grandmother Rose Naranjo-especially noted for her development of polished siennaware with fire clouds-is honored as the family matriarch. Polly Folwell's mother, Jody Folwell (see Sept./Oct. 2003, p. 84), is a highly respected leader among contemporary potters and a top award winner who earned a master's degree in political science. Jody's pots often portray themes of political and social commentary. Her father, Hank Folwell, is a painter of modern art. Hank and Jody's dialogues around the kitchen table offered a fertile educational environment. Younger sister Susan Folwell is another award-winning potter (including Best of Show at the Eight Northern Pueblos Arts and Crafts Fair) who has taken the art in new directions (see Sept./Oct. '03, p. 52). The two sisters and mother maintain a close relationship, talking weekly about pottery, art, politics, family, and Pueblo and world affairs. Jody and Susan also are both senior pottery judges at major Indian art competitions. However, Susan had to disqualify herself from judging the 2003 Heard show when the pottery competition came down to her cousin Jody Naranjo and her sister Polly Rose!

The birth of the famous "9-11" pot was difficult, Folwell recalls. The first two attempts cracked and exploded, but she did not give up, telling herself, "Life is hard enough without crying over a cracked pot." The third pot survived the firing. She worked on and off for a year in carving and painting the design. "Before 9-11, we thought that we were invincible against terrorism. After 9-11, we learned that we're not really in control of anything. I don't think we, as potters, have that much control over our pots, either. I think Mother Earth works through each of us-through my grandmother, my mother, my sister, me, and now through my daughter."

Polly Rose Folwell's work can be found occasionally at Robert Nichols Gallery in Santa Fe, Andrea Fisher Fine Arts in Santa Fe, Grey Dog Trading Co. in Tucson, Arizona, and Modo Gallery in New York. She will also attend the 2004 Heard Indian Fair & Market. Or write to Rt. 5, Box 453, Española, NM 87532.

Mark Tahbo

Mark Tahbo grew up and lives today at First Mesa in Hopi, a Puebloan community located in northeastern Arizona. He is a member of the Tobacco Clan, with ancient roots in the American Southwest. Tahbo's style of pottery is classified as Sikyatki Revival Ware, named after the Yellow House village, which is known for its fine clay pottery that fires with swirling yellow, orange and red colors of a desert sunset. Sikyatki-style potters' fantastic designs feature animals, birds, butterflies and clouds abstracted in counterbalanced patterns painted with the juice of wild spinach, mustard or beeweed plants. Using a traditional yucca brush for his painting and local native clay for the vessel, Tahbo creates hand-coiled pottery jars and bowls that are then fired outdoors in a pit, in the tradition of his ancestors.

"I live just a skip and a hop northeast of Sikyatki, the old village," he notes. "I go up there a lot in the fall and winter when the rattlers go into hibernation. This is where my thoughts of pottery come to me. There is a path that leads to the top of the mesa, where the petroglyphs can be seen. I touch them softly. In my early years, I looked at these designs for inspiration."

Much of the knowledge of traditional pottery making came from his great-grandmother, the late Grace Chapella (ca.1874­1980). "She used to hold my hands and rub them," Tahbo recalls, "as if she was rubbing into my hands the gift of creativity. Then she said confidently, 'I know you have it.' I loved to touch her skin, so silky, thin and transparent."

After Grandmother Grace passed on into the next world, recalls Tahbo, "I started venturing down different paths. My designs were inspired by the seasons. During harvest time, I painted corn, melons and squash. I observed flocks of birds and swarms of bats in migration. I also explored a spatter technique. One of my friends said my spatter designs looked like the paintings of an abstract painter named Jackson Pollock. Because the lower village is called Polacca, my friend started to call me 'Jackson Polacca.' I think the old Sikyatki potters were really modern artists."

Like the great American painter Pollock, Tahbo also suffered in the past from a drinking problem. He tried to stop, but relapsed three times. He told himself that he just wanted to have a "little glass of wine" to fit in at the art openings. Finally, he gathered up all the bottles and threw them away for good. He quit his job as a cook and devoted himself to being a full-time artist.

His years of dedicated work have paid off, with a steady stream of collectors and a mountain of ribbons and awards. At the Santa Fe Indian Market, for instance, Tahbo has won the Charles Loloma Memorial Award and the Helen Naha Memorial Award for Excellence in Traditional Hopi Pottery, and he was recognized as the top traditional Hopi potter three years in a row-an unparalleled achievement. His Heard Museum Guild Indian Fair & Market awards include Best of Division, Best of Class and a Judge's Choice Award.

Tahbo is grateful that he developed his early pottery skills under the watchful eye of Grandmother Grace. "She used to make little pinch pots while gazing out the window," he recalls. Toward the end of her life, she sometimes felt the spirit of Nampeyo-a neighbor for decades and the most famous of all Hopi/Tewa potters-had come back to visit. "Grandmother Grace would tell me, 'My grandchild! Come and see what Nampeyo wants.' I got up, looked outside and said, 'No one's out there.' Grandmother Grace would reply, 'Maybe she'll come back again.'" In a sense, Nampeyo has come back again through the revival of Sikyatki-style pottery fostered by Grandmother Grace, Mark Tahbo and hundreds of other Hopi/Tewa potters.

Mark Tahbo's work can be found primarily at King Galleries in Scottsdale, Arizona, but he is also represented by Jill Giller of Native American Collections in Denver, Andrea Fisher Fine Arts in Santa Fe and the Heard Museum Shop and Bookstore. He will also be showing at the 2004 Heard Indian Fair & Market (March 6-7).

Jacquie Stevens

Jacquie Stevens was raised by her traditional grandparents in Nebraska on the reservation of the Winnebago, a Siouan-speaking tribe known for its history of powerful women leaders. In 1766, English explorer Jonathan Carver recorded that "the great tribe of the Winnebagoes" was presided over by a "queen." Two centuries later, Stevens has emerged as leader in contemporary Indian pottery.

Stevens grew up around her grandmother and an aunt who were advocates for Indian rights in the 1960s and '70s. Her grandmother attended Carlisle Indian School with Jim Thorpe, the great Sauk and Fox athlete, and she believed passionately in the importance of education. Thus Stevens' education began with lessons in nature while gathering wild plants, mushrooms and berries with her grandmother. Over the years, she developed a consuming interest in art, and after learning of Santa Fe's Institute of American Indian Arts (IAIA), she visited the campus. Unfortunately, IAIA scholarships were not available then, so she attended the University of Colorado in Boulder.

But an opportunity to enroll at IAIA arose in 1975, and she jumped at it. Here she met her mentor and friend, Otellie Loloma, a Hopi woman respected as one of the greatest teachers in the history of Native arts education. Loloma was a master of ceramic arts and a graduate of the prestigious Alfred University in New York, where she attended courses with her former husband, jeweler and ceramist Charles Loloma. "Otellie never told you what to do," Stevens recalls. "She just gave you the basics and let you go. My first pots were lopsided, but Otellie said that she loved them. She always found something beautiful in everything. She said, 'Pottery is like people. Nothing's perfect in nature.' When I learned that I didn't have to be perfect, then I felt free to create."

In fact, she blossomed, developing her own unique style inspired by "line, form and shadow" and the traditional corrugated utilitarian wares of her Winnebago ancestors. "I also drew from traditional Winnebago ribbonwork designs," she says. "I collected baskets and began to weave basketry into my pots. I like the interplay between light and shadow that formed inside my pots."
At IAIA, Stevens was introduced to the history of modern art. "I was looking at photographs by the American abstract painter Jasper Johns and went to see the real ones in L.A. From books, I thought the paintings were black and white, but the real ones were very subtle purples and lavenders." She began searching for natural clays with delicate colors, gathering clay with Loloma. "I found some red clay that fired white. I found some Nebraska clay that fired dusty rose. We found some wonderful clay near Cerrillos, and then it just disappeared. We could never find it again. Otellie and I made pottery together. She always had her hands in the clay."

Many of Stevens' plainware pots are made with clay that contains tiny flakes of mica, a mineral that sparkles in the sunlight. "While cleaning clay one day, I discovered mica flakes, so I saved them to mix in with my other clay," she says. "I was so excited when I learned of a huge mica source near Taos Pueblo. I went up there and saw their beautiful micaceous bean pots. I came to love mica so much, I even wear it on my skin like glitter."

For this interview, Stevens was invited to the Center for Indigenous Arts & Cultures in Santa Fe and surrounded with examples of her early pots set next to some Otellie Loloma pots. Stevens became so animated at one point that she proclaimed, "I feel like Otellie's spirit is here with us right now!" As she spoke Otellie's name, thunder crackled loudly outside, despite the fact that the skies shone blue out both windows. After it happened three times in a row, a most peculiar feeling overcame us, and Stevens jumped up. "I just have to look outside right now!" We raced onto the deck and looked toward the heart of downtown Santa Fe. Delicate sheets of softly falling rain, illuminated by brilliant sunshine, sparkled likemica. The vision brought tears to Jacquie's eyes. We stood silently, feeling the mist on our cheeks.

Jacquie Stevens' work can be found at Andrea Fisher Fine Pottery in Santa Fe and Modo Gallery in New York. She will also be present for the 2004 Heard Indian Fair & Market.

Rebecca Lucario grew up in the Yellow Corn Clan at Acoma, an old Pueblo village known as "Sky City," located 60 miles west of Albuquerque, New Mexico. She learned traditional pottery-making techniques from her maternal grandmother, Delores S. Sanchez (ca.1902­1991). "My grandmother let me play with the clay they used to plaster their adobe house," Lucario says. "We made little animal figures and pinch pots with red clay. I still have two pots that I made at the age of eight. One is a flower plate; the other a vase with lines. She never let us play with her clay, because clay is very sacred."

At the age of 12, Grandmother Delores taught Lucario to "ask Mother Earth for clay." They gathered natural clay and paint pigments, as well as pottery shards (pieces of older, broken pottery) for tempering (strengthening) the clay. More than 20 years ago, Rebecca's sister (who creates storytellers) suggested they collect different kinds of clay across the Acoma Reservation and beyond. For a decade, the two gathered many types of clay, keeping a journal of each specimen's precise origin. They discovered that natural clays come in a rainbow of colors: rust, orange, yellow, green, blue, gray, lavender and many more. They also recorded how some clays turn into different colors after firing; for instance, one yellow clay turns red.

These and other secrets of the clay were revealed to Lucario over the years, including methods of creating the most difficult of forms-very small and very large pots. "Marie Z. Chino taught me how to make really big pots," she explains. "She was a very kind and loving woman, helpful to me and a source of inspiration." Other sources of inspiration and aid she cites include her mother Katherine Lewis, her aunt Ethel Shields, her aunt Marie Juanico and the most famous Acoma potter, Lucy Lewis.

While she grew up in a family of potters, Lucario notes, "I never thought that I could make a living with pottery. I worked at Head Start, and pottery was a hobby. My sister Marilyn really encouraged me. One year, our friend Lucy Lowden, a Jemez textile artist who is married to an Acoma man, asked me if I would like to share her booth at the Santa Fe Indian Market, which I did, and I began to attend regularly. One year I won a major award, Best of Division. I never had won anything that big in my whole life. It really surprised me!"

While Lucario was originally noted for traditional Acoma-style pottery, she experimented with Mimbres Revival­style pottery featuring pictorial animal and insect designs, and she is now best known for finely detailed optical "eyedazzler" patterns. The hardest to make are her plates, which measure up to 30 inches in diameter. She explains, "The secret to making plates is to not make them too thin or too thick. You also have to knead the clay well to get out all the air bubbles." One of her amazing plates, in the collection of William and Jane Buchsbaum of Santa Fe, was featured on the cover of the 2002 catalog for the highly acclaimed Changing Hands: Art Without Reservation touring exhibit organized by the American Craft Museum of New York City. She gasped when she learned that they created a giant banner with her pottery design, unfurled at the opening of the exhibit. "The recognition kind of snuck up on me," she says humbly.
Rebecca Lucario's work can be found at Andrea Fisher Fine Arts in Santa Fe. The artist will also be present at the 2004 Heard Indian Fair & Market.

Dr. Gregory Schaaf (Cherokee) is director of the Center for Indigenous Arts & Cultures, a nonprofit research center and small museum in Santa Fe. Schaaf and his wife Angie Yan Schaaf are publishing a 20-volume American Indian Art Series of reference books covering all Native art media. Already released are five books, including two volumes on pottery, a book on weavers, and book one of three planned on jewelry. Contact: P.O. Box 8627, Santa Fe, NM 87504-8627 or e-mail Indians@nets.com.

Ambrose Atencio (Santo Domingo) won awards in 2003 at both the Santa Fe Indian Market and the Eight Northern Indian Pueblos Arts & Crafts Show. His goal is to produce the largest hand-coiled, pit-fired and traditionally painted polychrome storage jars.

Joseph and Barbara Cerno (Acoma/Hopi) make both the largest and the smallest traditional Acoma pots, running from larger than 24 inches in diameter down to 1 inch.

Rondina Huma (Hopi) is known for her traditional pottery with highly detailed designs. With a tiny yucca brush, she paints up to 280 different pottery shard designs on a single pot.

Jake Koopee (Hopi) paints his traditional pottery with a confident, elegant flair. Encouraged by his aunt, Dextra Quotsquova, he experiments with different clays and paints with masterful results.

Christine McHorse (Navajo) coils and sculpts clay to form contemporary fine-art masterpieces. Her style-often executed in micaceous clay-emphasizes bold new shapes and a finely polished finish.

Elizabeth and Marcellus Medina (Zia/Jemez) work together. Elizabeth was born in Jemez and married into Zia. She received permission to make traditional Zia-style pots, which Marcellus paints with realistic buffalo, eagle and other dance figures.

Noreen Simplicio (Zuni) is famous for re-creating three-dimensional village scenes of Zuni Pueblo on the shoulders of her ollas. Tiny figures climb ladders and sit on rooftops.

Judy and Lincoln Tafoya (Santa Clara) have won blue ribbons for their large, traditional blackware and redware jars, deep-carved with designs of clouds, water and the Water Serpent, Avanyu.

Dora Tse-pe (Zia/San Ildefonso) is one of the great sgrafitto artists, working in the technique of low relief carving developed by Tse Pe, Tony Da, Joseph Lonewolf and Grace Medicine Flower. Born at Zia and married into San Ildefonso, she has won top awards for three decades.

Emma Yepa (Jemez) is a third-generation Coyote Clan potter. For 20 years, she has refined stone-polished redware and tanware pottery, with her swirl pots winning top awards.

Additional Pottery Artists
Calvin Anaya, Joe Baca, Daryl Candelaria, Delores Curin, Ursula Curin, Ignacia Duran, Anthony Durand, Debra Duwyenie, Preston Duwyenie, Juanita Fragua, Tammy Garcia, Shawna Rustin-Garcia, Glen Gomez, Cavan Gonzales, Michael Kantina, Alton Komalestewa, Sharon Lewis, Yvonne Lucas, Steve Lucas, Ron Martinez, Rainy Naha, Les Namingha, Jean Sahmie Nampeyo, Nyla Sahmie Nampeyo, Rachel Sahmie Nampeyo, Jody Naranjo, Thomas Nastaway, Virgil Ortiz, Ruby Panana, Dextra Quotsquova, Diego Romero, Russell Sanchez, Noreen Simplicio, Mary Small, Richard Zane Smith, Stella Teller, Robert Tenorio, Dorothy Torivio, Lorraine Williams, Rose Williams, Angie Yazzie, Nancy Youngblood and Nathan Youngblood.

Some Leading Galleries for Fine Indian Pottery
Adobe Gallery-221 Canyon Road, Santa Fe, NM; 505/955-0550
Andrea Fisher Fine Pottery-100 W. San Francisco St., Santa Fe, NM; 505/986-1234
Andrews Pueblo Pottery-303 Romero, NW, Albuquerque, NM; 505/243-0414
Case Trading Post-Wheelwright Museum, 704 Camino Lejo, Santa Fe, NM; 505/982-4635
Faust Gallery-7103 E. Main St., Scottsdale, AZ; 480/946-6345
Heard Museum Shop and Bookstore-2301 N. Central Ave., Phoenix, AZ; 800/252-8344
Indian Craft Shop-Dept. of Interior Building, 1849 C St. NW, Room 1023, Washington, DC; 202/208-4056
King Galleries of Scottsdale-7100 E. Main St., #1, Scottsdale, AZ 85251; 480/481-0187
Lovena Ohl/Waddell Gallery-7144 E. Main St., Scottsdale, AZ; 480/946-6764
McGee's Indian Art-Keams Canyon, AZ; 800/854-1359
Packard's on the Plaza-61 Old Santa Fe Trail, Santa Fe, NM; 505/983-9241