Steve Lucas is one of the leading Hopi-Tewa potters working today.  Each piece is coil-built, stone polished, painted with native clay slips and bee-weed (black), and traditionally fired.  Steve has won “Best of Show” at Santa Fe Indian Market, and his work remains some of the most refined and creative.  This is one of the few plates Steve has made in the past decade. The plate is fully polished on the front and back and fully painted on the front.  There are multiple katsina faces including Sun, Longhair, Hummingbird, and others.  They are painted with bee-weed (black) and highlighted with white, green, and red clays. There are even areas where the white or red clays are layered to create texture!  It is extraordinary and exciting to see a piece with such complexity of design.  The Katsinas are meant to be representative and not literal in appearance.  Amazingly, Steve can use so many different colors of clay and the result is fluid but visually engaging.   The piece was traditionally fired and has a dramatic coloration from the firing.  It is signed on the bottom in the clay, “S. Lucas” and a mudhead (koyemsi) and an ear of corn (corn clan).  It is an innovative design in a classic form.

“In my pottery the katsina masks are not exact representations of them but simply have elements of them in there. I would go and watch the dances, and I liked the way the katsinas looked so I began to put them on the pottery.  I try to mix the abstract and the classic design elements on the top to show how the two could be connected. I was always interested in looking at stars and finding inspiration there. Where I fire there are no streetlights. I can sit at night and see everything and watch a lot of stars.  Steve Lucas, Spoken Through Clay

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Lucas, Steve (b. 1955)

Steve Lucas

Steve Lucas (b.1955) is a great-great-grandson of Nampeyo of Hano.  His grandmother was Rachel Nampeyo, and his great-grandmother was Annie Healing.  While Steve grew up around potters, he primarily learned the art from his aunt, Dextra Quotskuyva Nampeyo.  His pottery is amazingly thin-walled, and each piece has a dynamic use of form and design.  The pottery is coil-built, stone-polished, traditionally painted, and native-fired.  Steve uses traditional designs and often gives his own creative spin to the ancient imagery.  His pottery is signed with his name and the Mudhead symbol, or Koyemsi. This is reflective of his Hopi-Tewa clan.  Steve Lucas has won numerous awards for his pottery, including "Best of Show" at Santa Fe Indian Market. In addition, Steve is a featured artist in the book by the gallery owner, Charles S. King, 'Spoken Through Clay.'  We are pleased to carry Steve's work at our Scottsdale and Santa Fe locations. PLEASE NOTIFY ME OF NEW ADDITIONS FROM THIS ARTIST