Special Value Offer: Kewa Pueblo Pictorial Storage Jar [SOLD]

Special Value Offer: We have been requested to offer this at a reduced price of 40% from the original price of $2200 to $1250.

This large storage jar was purchased by the current owner directly from the potter about 15 years ago. It is decorated with pictorial elements of Mimbres rams and yucca plants.  Pictorial elements on Kewa pottery, other than birds, are quite rare as almost all Kewa pottery is decorated with geometric designs in bold scale. For a potter at Kewa to use Mimbres animals on a jar is most unusual. 

According to Gregory Schaaf, in the referenced book below, “Vidal Aguilar makes some of the largest polychrome ollas at Santo Domingo in the Aguilar family tradition.  His pottery is hand coiled and polished.  His black paint is a mineral pigment used centuries ago, rather than the typically used Guaco or Mountain Bee plant. His red [and] white paints are natural clay.  He fires his pottery in a pit.”

Potters of the Aguilar family have always been creative and experimented with designs not seen at Santo Domingo previously.  The Aguilar sisters, of the late 1800s, are the ones who created the beautiful black and red jars and the almost totally black jars in the 1920s.  Other members of the current Aguilar clan make large jars in the Tewa style of black-on-black.  Maybe it is not unusual for Vidal Aguilar to use Mimbres animals on his pottery.  Perhaps he is introducing a new style at Santo Domingo.

Condition: original condition

Provenance: from a gentleman who previously lived at Cochiti Lake and now lives in San Francisco. 

Reference: Southern Pueblo Pottery: 2,000 Artist Biographies by Gregory and Angie Schaaf