Red Sgraffito Seed Pot with Frog Design [SOLD]

The Mimbres people were a branch of the prehistoric group called the Mogollon who lived in what is today southwestern New Mexico. Their pottery designs have intrigued generations of art collectors and scholars. Contemporary potters use these designs as a means of expressing their connection to the past.  They also interpret them in new and unique manners that are both traditional and contemporary at the same time.

Art Cody and Martha Suazo were a young couple who married in the early 1970s.  Cody was a Kiowa Indian who moved to his wife’s pueblo when they married.  Martha convinced her husband to help her decorate her pots, and together they created small masterpieces for a short period of time. They signed their work “Haungooah,” the name of Art’s grandfather who was a well-known Kiowa ledger artist and scout.  Martha passed away in the late 1970s and Cody continued to make pottery on his own until his untimely passing in 1985.

In this piece, the talented couple fashioned a small red seed jar with a Mimbres-style frog design. The frog has a surprised look on its face, as if he jumped out of water, only to discover a human ready to grab him and whisk him away.

It is signed Haungooah and dated 11-74.

Condition: original condition

Recommended Reading: Pueblo Indian Pottery 750 Artist Biographies by Gregory Schaaf

Provenance: from a family from Santa Fe which is beginning to downsize its very large collection of pottery and paintings by New Mexico Native artists.