Today, I want to introduce you to one of our younger, up and coming carvers: Justin Gomez. He’s brother to Jeremy Gomez, who made some of the beaver fetishes featured yesterday and the alabaster eagle-feather pendants highlighted here a couple of months ago. He’s also nephew to the late Emerson Gomez, a master carver who was a distant cousin but very, very close friend of Wings himself.
Emerson was known for fetishes and sculpture of all sorts, including pipe bowls, but he was perhaps best-known for his renderings of animal spirits. Bears were one of his favorite choices, and he carved their profiles in a distinctive style, making even his older unsigned pieces instantly recognizeable to us.
Now, both Justin and Jeremy have carried on his tradition, and to a lesser extent, his style of carving and choice of stone. Emerson used pipestone, local Pilar slate, and occasionally alabaster. Most of the pieces Justin makes for us are from alabaster, and they show his uncle’s distinctive influences, particularly in the ears and brow and upper portion of the face. And yet, Justin has taken the form and worked it subtly, altering the angle of the jaw, the slop of the neck, and making a family style wholly his own.
None of these pieces are nearly as expensive as his late uncle’s would be. If he keeps it up, though, his work will be collectible one day. As it is, he’s already found a way to give each of his pieces powerfully distinctive personalities. Small and simple as they are, these three little bears are among my favorites of all the work we carry by other Native artists, so I wanted you to meet them today.
The one shown above is the simplest of all, but in my opinion, he’s also the most perfect in form and shape. Pure Bear; nothing else. Because he’s rendered in plain alabaster in a putty-colored shade, some might think of him as a polar bear, despite our great distance from Arctic regions. To me, he’s a young Spirit Bear, like the one in one of our old stories — rare, with white fur, but neither polar nor albino. A messenger, a protector, a medicine spirit. From its description in the Other Artists: Fetishes Gallery here on the site:
This perfect little hump-backed bear, carved out of dove-gray [white] alabaster by Justin Gomez (Taos Pueblo), fits perfectly into the palm of your hand. The stone from which he emerges is smoky and smooth, with a delicate tracery of fragile white lines in the matrix. He stands, calmly but alertly, atop a rough-cut base of translucent orange alabaster. Bear stands 2″ long by 1.75 high, including base (dimensions approximate).
Alabaster; orange alabaster
$35 + shipping, handling, and insurance
He’s not the only bear we have made by Justin. We’re lucky enough to have two of his tiny medicine bears, as well. We covered the “medicine” fetish concept here recently: the attaching of small medicine bundles, or offering bundles, to the fetish itself. In keeping with the smallness and subtlety of the carvings, Justin uses very simple bundles of tiny feathers and beads or bits of shell:
This little hump-backed medicine bear by Justin Gomez (Taos Pueblo) is rendered in delicate orange alabaster, mottled with lacy striations that give it the look of orange sherbet. He stands firmly on a base of rough-cut orange alabaster, more translucent than the stone from which he has emerged, peering out beneath a medicine bundle of feathers and beads of stone and shell. Including base, he stands 2.75″ long by 1-7/8″ high (dimensions approximate). Another view shown below.
Orange alabaster; feathers; shell bead; hematite
$40 + shipping, handling, and insuranc
SOLDe
These bears underscore the widely variable beauty of Justin’s chosen medium. Alabaster comes in a diversity of colors: the plain white alabaster ranges from the color of snow to dark and dusky grays and putty-colored taupe shades. Some contains multiple shades in a single block of stone: white; orange or pink or red; even green. Pink alabaster appears in swatches of near-white pink, in opaque shades that are solidly, unquestionably pink, and in semi-translucent forms the range from dove gray to deep maroon. The same holds true for orange alabaster, which can appear clearly orange and slightly glassy, as it does in the bases on which each of these bears are set; it can also manifest in lacy striations like those shown in both the bear immediately above and the one below, giving it the look of agate or Mexican onyx.
It’s another perfect little hump-backed bear by Justin Gomez (Taos Pueblo), this time gazing skyward. This bear has been coaxed from boldly-striated orange alabaster with colors so intense that the lacy bands are nearly brick red, interspersed with lines of icy white. He stands firmly on a rough-cut slab of palest orange alabaster, beneath a medicine bundle of feathers, a shell bead, and a carved mother-of-pearl medicine bird. Including base, he stands 2.5″ long by 1-7/8″ high (dimensions approximate). Another view shown below.
Orange alabaster; feathers; shell bead bead; mother-of-pearl
$40 + shipping, handling, and insurance
SOLD
But despite the inclusions and matrices, it remains a soft, touchable, workable stone for carving — and for holding. And every one of these tiny bears just begs to be held.
And, of course, Bear’s traditional identity as a protector, as a medicine symbol, makes him a welcome resident on desk, table, or mantel — unlike his namesake, who is a bit too large to welcome indoors (as well as a bit too fierce). We saw our first signs that Bear had been here, not far from the house, back in late August or early September — unusually early. From the evidence, it appeared likely that it was a young bear, so we’re hoping that he’s surviving on his own.
In the meantime, we can also hope that these little spirits will help protect him as we head into winter.
~ Aji
