Isleta Pueblo Polychrome Child’s Water Jar [SOLD]

Prior to 1880, potters at Isleta Pueblo made plain red pottery that was devoid of design or decoration.  The poor quality red clay at Isleta was not suitable for making high-quality thin-walled pottery.  Pottery from Isleta of that time is not in large quantity in any museum collection because it was not considered worthy of such.  When one looks at it today, however, it is amazingly beautiful in its red purity and simplicity.

In 1880, a large group of Laguna Pueblo Indians permanently moved and set up a village near Isleta which they named Oraibi.  The massive move was a result of a dispute with Laguna.  The Laguna women were makers of polychrome pottery and they took the techniques and designs with them.  Not only were the designs and colors attractive to potters at Isleta, the Laguna potters knew how to use proper temper to achieve strong and thin walls.  Eventually, the Laguna style became the Isleta style and Laguna designs still appear today on pottery from Isleta. 

It was this new style of pottery that Isleta women hauled to the train station in Albuquerque every day to sell to tourists traveling the Atchison Topeka and Santa Fe (ATSF) Rail Line from Chicago to California and return.  Popular with the train travelers were salt and pepper shakers, candlesticks, small dishes, small bowls with twisted handles and other small items not traditional to Isleta homes.  Large water jars and functional bowls were made for use at the pueblo.

The Laguna style of polychrome pottery is so ingrained in Isleta history that it has become the traditional Isleta Pueblo pottery style of the last 100 years.  Fortunately, some Isleta potters continued making the redware bowls using Laguna-taught tempering materials and those are of high quality and occasionally seen on the market today.

Condition: very good condition

Recommended Reading:  Pueblo Pottery of the New Mexico Indians by Betty Toulouse

Provenance: from the collection of a family from Colorado