This rectangular domed turquoise ring is surrounded by a twisted silver rope and mounted on a scalloped-edge backing, all of which is mounted on a split shank silver band. The ring is a wonderful example of the silverwork by Navajo smiths in the 1940s and 1950s.

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I was never aware that Helen Hardin ever executed one of her paintings on a small clay surface, but here is one, and maybe the only one in existence.  The image is very similar to an acrylic painting on artist board entitled "Portrait of Man" by Helen Hardin.  There is no title on the tile unless it is on the back of the tile which is not visible since it is framed. The tile is dated 1972.

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Somewhere, sometime, somebody established names for different periods of pueblo pottery.  Excavations at prehistoric sites unearthed hundreds of years of pottery examples and names were assigned to each period.

At today's occupied pueblos, archaeological excavations have generally not been permitted.  One very limited excavation permitted at Acoma in the early 20^th century revealed that earlier pottery was decorated glazeware-designs applied with a paint containing lead ore.  From excavated examples Frank Harlow was able to extrapolate that Acoma glazeware spanned the years from 1300 to 1700.

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Carmelita Dunlap (1925-1999) was the daughter of Juanita and Romando Vigil of San Ildefonso Pueblo.  Juanita was a sister of Maria Martinez and she passed away when Carmelita was very young.  Juanita's two sisters, Maria Martinez and Desideria Montoya, raised her.  She took turns staying with Maria for a few months and then with Desideria for a few months.  She learned to make pottery by watching Maria and Desideria at work.

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This is a superb historic polychrome jar created most probably between 1890 and 1900. This fine vessel is coil-formed in native clay with the addition of traditional Zia paste temper, crushed basaltic lava. The concave base and underbody are stone-polished bare paste with a red band at the top of the underbody, with the neck interior red slipped with a black rim.

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Felipita Aguilar Garcia was an active potter from the 1890s to the 1930s and her sister, Asuncion Aguilar Cate, was active from the 1890s to about 1915.  They were exceptional potters, probably the best at the pueblo at that time, and they produced beautiful ollas with traditional Santo Domingo designs.  Later, they became famous for the jars that were largely black and red or mostly black, but they earlier produced ones like this one.

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The predominant design element on this pottery jar is a spiral with a circle at each end on which are two triangular elements on each circle. This element has appeared on Zia pottery from as early as 1800 on what has been referred to as San Pablo Polychrome, continuing through the Trios Polychrome period and into the Zia Polychrome era.

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Long before Black-on-black pottery became the staple at San Ildefonso Pueblo, potters there had produced a variety of pottery types- Black-on-cream, Black-on-Red and Polychrome types predominately.  Powhoge Polychrome, which was black-on-cream, in the 1850-1880 period gave way to San Ildefonso Polychrome, starting in the 1890s, in which red paint was added to the design.  Concurrently, some potters began abandoning the red paint on the rim in favor of black around the same time.

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Joe Herrera, born into a rich art inheritance through his father's pueblo of Cochiti and his mother's pueblo of San Ildefonso, was painting before he entered the Indian School in Santa Fe. His mother, Tonita Peña (Quah Ah) gave him thorough training in art techniques.

According to Clara Lee Tanner, "Herrera developed three outstanding traits which are reflected in his work-one in which there is a perfectly delineated single dance figure, the second a dance group and, third, an abstract style utilizing native designs. In his execution of the group and single dance figures, there is no competitor for perfection. Often he has used a colored paper to complement the tones in which his subjects are painted. He further enhances the excellent color contrasts by doing very fine work."

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Pop Pina was the daughter of Pop Chalee of Taos Pueblo. Her English name was Betty Jean Hopkins.  She lived with her parents at Taos Pueblo until her father, who was proficient with metal working, was hired to work at the secretive Manhattan Project at Los Alamos in 1943. 

Pop Pina was enrolled in the Santa Fe Indian School in 1935 at age 9, but when her dad was hired as a teacher, she had to leave because children of teachers were not allowed to attend.

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Tonita Peña was born at San Ildefonso Pueblo, but was sent by her father, following the death of her mother, to live with an aunt at Cochiti Pueblo at the age of 12. She spent the remainder of her life there. She had begun painting when she was seven years old. She was the only woman painter in her generation and was part of the original group who participated in the contemporary watercolor movement.  She is considered a San Ildefonso painter.

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José Angela Aguilar, sometimes known as Joe Aguilar, was the son of Susana Aguilar-a well-known potter-and is known to have painted pottery for his mom.  He was the husband of Rosalie Simbola Aguilar, also a potter, for whom he painted pottery.  He was an exceptional painter.  Kenneth Chapman included him on a list of fifteen men who painted pottery at San Ildefonso before 1940.  His son, Alfred Aguilar, said that his father formed pots, as well as painting them.

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   Alfonso Roybal (1898-1955) Awa Tsireh was painting before 1917 while he was still a teenager. He was the oldest of the early group of pueblo painters. His formal education had not extended beyond primary grades. He was versatile in his styles of painting in that he was equally comfortable with representational or semi-realistic.  Most of his work is in the Santa Fe Indian School two-dimensional style, particularly his early work and many of those were single-figure images.

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   Robert Draper was a Navajo born in Chinle, Arizona, of a Navajo mother and a Hopi-Laguna father.  From the age of two, he lived with his grandparents who raised him. He was given their surname when he entered school at the age of eight. He attended Chinle Boarding School on the Navajo Reservation, Inter-Mountain Indian School in Utah for four years, and the Institute of America Indian Arts in Santa Fe. He served a tour of duty in the U. S. Marine Corps.

Draper concentrated on painting in the European or semi-European style, presenting scenes of the beautiful landscapes of the Navajo Reservation.

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Robert Draper was equally adept at painting in miniature scale as in larger scale.  This postcard size painting of a single hogan in the vast area of the Navajo Reservation was rendered in the fine detail that Draper executes in full-scale.  The buttes, sky of billowing clouds, land with snow and rocks and the single hogan spewing smoke are amazingly detailed.  Draper was a master artist who passed away much too soon.  It is to our benefit that he left a legacy of extraordinary paintings to  be enjoyed for decades by collectors.

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The painting style of Calvin Toddy could not be more different than that of his famous father, Beatien Yazz.  Whereas Beatien painted in the early 20th century Santa Fe Indian School style, Calvin paints more in the European art style. His paintings in miniature scale are absolutely of the finest detail imaginable. His brush stroke is sure and firm. The leaves on the cottonwood tree and the paint on the horse are extremely detailed.

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Dorothy Trujillo, who passed away in 1999, was an outstanding potter. She was originally from Jemez Pueblo, but moved to Cochiti following her marriage to Onofre Trujillo, and obtained permission to make pottery using Cochiti clay.

Dorothy was one of the early potters to make storytellers.  She was from a family of outstanding potters. Her sisters, Mary E. Toya, Marie Edna Coriz, Alma Concha Loretto, Fannie Wall Loretto, and Lenora Lupe Lucero, are famous potters as well.  Interestingly, her sisters also married out of their native pueblo and moved to the pueblo of their spouses.

In true Cochiti Pueblo tradition, Dorothy made her figurine with eyes closed and mouth open. The closed eyes represent "thought" and the open mouth represents "storytelling." Her adult holds four children.

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   Mary Martin, who passed away in 2011, was one of the potters who specialized in making storyteller figurines.  According to Barbara Babcock in her book The Pueblo Storyteller,

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In the 1960s and 1970s, Dextra Quotskuyva Nampeyo worked with her mother, Rachel Namingha, and painted on her pottery the traditional Sikyatki designs made famous by the Nampeyo family. She continued this for a number of years, yet she never repeated the same design ever, according to her.  Later she developed her own unique style of design which she continued using throughout her career.

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   Grace Navasie-Lomahquahu is a daughter of Joy Navasie.  She started making pottery around 1980 and, at that time, her mother painted the designs for her.  Grace now does the painting as well as the construction.

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