Last night, the water came. Not in the sense we usually mean the phrase here (which generally refers to it flowing down the ditches and across the land), but straight from the sky, in a heavy, steady, soaking rain. this morning, the rain barrels are full, the earth still damp, and while the forecast is for another hot dry day, already-towering thunderheads and oppressive humidity suggest otherwise.
We may not get more rain today, but we are grateful for last night’s gift. And we are reminded anew of the importance of water: the First Medicine, the one that births us all as surely as it midwifed the sculpted features of this land, the one that keeps the land and us alive and plays a role in old ways too numerous to count.
For many of our peoples across this land mass, water is central to numerous forms of ceremony. It has a role in everything from the sweat lodge to the Tipi Way, from more modern markers of formal events and rites of passage to the honoring of ancestors long walked on. And in this place where water is so much more than life, where drought is always a risk and now a deepening reality, it lies at culture’s heart, tradition’s spirit, and the relationships of love and respect that link us to the spirits and to the world around us.
Today’s featured works are only three representatives of the seven still remaining in inventory, each of them an eminently traditional work in their own way, recast in a contemporary style that still honors the oldest and most timeless of ways. Each is a small spirit cup, or mug, small enough to hold in your hands, each hand-coiled of the micaceous clay for which this place and its potters are known all over the world. Each small cup is sculpted and etched on the front, each with its own figurative spirit emergent from its farther edge, each the embodiment of traditional practices brought together to permit the holder to honor the ways and the water.
Because our themes this work are built around the motifs of hearts and the love they represent in the collective consciousness, we begin with one, shown above, that speaks of the love that lies at the heart of Mother Earth. From its description in the Other Artists: Pottery gallery here on the site:
Grandmother sings to the corn plants as she works, her head and voice rising from the side of this old-style handle-less mug. Brought forth from the body of this hand-coiled micaceous mug by Jessie Marcus (Taos Pueblo), she wears her hair tied back in the traditional bun, bangs on her forehead. The corn plants she nurtures are incised into the mug’s front. Stands 3.75″ high on figurative side (dimensions approximate).
Micaceous clay
$125 + shipping, handling, and insurance
Feminine spirits are often associated with the waters and the rain, with maternal motifs, with the nurturing and growth of that which sustains us. This one has always been one of my favorites for the practice that it embodies, that of singing to the corn (and other plants). Our peoples have always understood that our world is constructed, composed and constituted, of animated and animating spirits far beyond our own, and we engage them as we would ourselves. And it is, perhaps, one of the reasons why, despite the drought, our garden is now thriving: We speak to the plants, offer prayers for their well-being.
We once had near two-dozen of these spirit cups in inventory, but the majority are long since gone. We do still have one other that represents a similarly feminine spirit, one emergent from the imagery of the Pueblo itself and especially the mountain behind it, available here.
But the feminine pieces were only one small part of Jessie’s body of work. She created a number of pieces featuring male figures, too, most of them summoned into existence in traditional dress, a blanket wrapped around head and shoulders. Of these, only one remains now; from its description in the same gallery:
An elder, wrapped in a traditional blanket, gazes watchfully over the wall of an old village home. He arises out of the bowl of an old-style mug made of hand-coiled micaceous clay, his blanket flowing downward to form its sides. The hallmarks of his home, an ancient Pueblo house, are molded in relief on the mug’s body, the details incised by hand on the front. Stands 3.75″ high on the figurative side (dimensions approximate).
Micaceous clay
$125 + shipping, handling, and insurance
Of the mugs featuring male figures, this is only one of the elders that remains. Jessie crafts them all in the tradition of Pueblo storytellers, with mouth open in speech or song. And the singing leads us to the last representative work from the male figures still in our inventory, one whose voice is raised in song . . . and whose moccasins are raised in dance.
This is one of four mugs still remaining wrought in the image of the traditional Buffalo Dancer. From its description, also in the same gallery:
Braids flying beneath his headdress of horns, the buffalo dancer moves his feet beneath a storm-swept sky. He emerges from the side of this old-style mug, hand-coiled by Jessie Marcus of the Pueblo’s micaceous clay. On the front, incised lightning bolts arc across the sky. Stands 3.75″ on figurative side (dimensions approximate).
Micaceous clay
$125 + shipping, handling, and insurance
As noted above, there are three others in this collection in miniature of micaceous Buffalo Dancers: here, here, and here. Each mug features a different etched pattern on its sculpted front; each dancer is unique, a couple of them with headdresses slightly askew, as happens in the heat and heart of the dance. All are exemplars of the old ways, the enactors of a hauntingly beautiful dance given life in a new form with clay and water.
And all of them are examples of love: of the earth, the clay from which they are wrought; of the individual people they represent; of the scenes and scapes and images etched into their surfaces; of the waters they are designed [momentarily only; they are not fired in way that enables waterproofing or drinking use] to hold. These small solid works are the very embodiment of life in this place — of culture’s heart, tradition’s spirit, and the love that flows both ways, like the water.
~ Aji
All content, including photos and text, are copyright Wings and Aji, 2020; all rights reserved. Nothing herein may used or reproduced in any form without the express written permission of the owner.
