San Ildefonso Polychrome Nineteenth Century Masterpiece [SOLD]

San Ildefonso Polychrome pottery differs from it predecessor pottery typology known as Powhoge Polychrome—one difference being the addition of red in the design.  Shapes also changed, as did design elements. The globular shape of Powhoge Polychrome gave way to a revival of the eighteenth-century olla shape.

In the late 1800s, there was a trend to stop using red paint on the rim and to use black.  Around 1905, San Ildefonso Pueblo potters adopted the use of a bentonite slip being used by Cochiti Pueblo potters, the difference being that San Ildefonso traditional slip required stone polishing and Cochiti slip required only rag polishing.  All of these factors aid in establishing a date for the older, historic pottery.

This jar has the round and globular shape of a Powhoge Polychrome jar, stone polished slip, and red rim paint.  It is conceivable to assign a date of 1880s to this jar.

The extraordinary design must have taken a considerable amount of time for the potter to design and apply.  It is by far the most comprehensive design the artist could have conceived. If one starts an analysis on the paired black zigzag lines at the mid-body and proceeds downward, there are oval elements of connected semicircles painted black.  Above the zigzag lines there are nestled into each depression single black outlined teardrop designs in red, white and black.

Just below the pair of framing lines at the neck is a continuous line of black arches under which are orange loops. This formal body design is offset by a humorous design of birds in flight around the neck of the jar.  Each bird is black with a white body and white face, both of which have orange dots within.

One would assume the painter of this jar started with the body design and expended all his or her energy doing that, so chose to loosen up a little and lighten the weight of the body design by painting birds in flight around the neck.  The mixture of a formal and complicated body design and a humorous and lightweight neck design actually works beautifully together.

Condition: structurally in excellent condition with some crazing of the white body slip and minor touch up of the white slip.

Provenance: this San Ildefonso Polychrome Nineteenth Century Masterpiece is from the extensive pottery collection of a family from Colorado

Reference and Recommended Reading: Pottery of the Pueblos of New Mexico 1700-1940 by Jonathan Batkin