Cochiti Pueblo Helen Cordero Singing Mother Figure [SOLD]

Helen Cordero was truly an original artist. Unable to fashion pottery vessels in a manner with which she could be satisfied, she changed her course to figurative pottery, rather than give up altogether. Little did she know that she was starting a new tradition in pueblo pottery production?

She first exhibited her early figurative pottery at a Kewa (Santo Domingo) Pueblo feast day in the early 1960s. Folk art collector, Alexander Girard, bought all the pieces and encouraged her to make more and bring them to him. He encouraged her to add more children and make larger pieces. When thinking this over, she remembered her grandfather and made an image in his honor with a number of children climbing over him. This was the beginning of the storyteller figurine.

Cordero also made other figurines. She made female figurines with Hopi hairstyles, turtles with children on their backs, animals, and nacimientos, female figures with pottery on their heads, and female figures with children.

Her female figurines with children are called Singing Mothers. She did not make female storytellers. All her storyteller figurines are male.

This Singing Mother is from the early 1970s and is exquisite. The one child in her arms is an infant. In Cordero fashion, the adult female has her eyes closed and her mouth open. She is wearing an exquisite traditional woven belt. Her dress has an embroidered design at the hem. She wears traditional pueblo moccasins and her head is draped with a shawl.

Singing Mothers are significantly rarer than Storytellers because Cordero made so few of them compared with the larger number of storytellers.

Condition:  The figurine is in excellent condition. 

Provenance: From the collection of a Santa Fe resident.

Recommended Reading:  The Pueblo Storyteller by Barbara Babcock