Begaye, Nathan – 8.5″ Wide Green “Butterfly” Raised Relief Jar (1996)
$ 2,500.00
This is a large wide shoulder jar by Nathan Begaye. He was a unique innovator among Pueblo and Navajo potters. His ancestry of both Hopi and Navajo let his work flow between the two distinctive styles and yet find their own unique space. His work used traditional designs, forms, and techniques, yet somehow appeared very modern. This jar is a combination of his carved and polychrome designs. The top has a butterfly that is carved into the clay with raised and rounded sections. The butterfly and the remainder of the jar is fully polished. The green is a clay that is high in copper. The area surrounding the butterfly is fully painted with various designs. One section has flowers, along the wings are geometric clouds and rain designs. Around the anetnnae are checkerboard designs in black, but also polychrome. The jar is very detailed and very colorful. There are purple, white, peach, red, teal, orange, blue, and brown clay colors used on this piece. The black is bee-weed (a plant). It is an extraordinary number of colors on this piece and the result is quite spectacular. I remember going to Nathan’s apartment when he lived in Phoenix. I would watch him work on painting his pottery. He would talk about each of the colors, and some were more difficult to source than others. The purple and blues, I remember, were the most difficult to find. The jar was traditionally fired to create the slight blushes on the surface. It is in very good condition with no chips, cracks, restoration, or repair. It is signed on the bottom, “Nathan Begaye”. It is from 1996. The last photo is a picture I took of Nathan when he was living in Phoenix. He moved there for several years, and I would go to his apartment and see what he was working on and hear the stories about his pottery, the clays, and his firings.
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WOW! This is an This is a wide shoulder jar by Nathan Begaye. He was a unique innovator among Pueblo and Navajo potters. His ancestry of both Hopi and Navajo let his work flow between the two distinctive styles and yet find their own unique space. His work used traditional designs, forms, and techniques, yet somehow appeared very modern. For many of his pieces, he would talk about them being “layered”, much like his own cultural and personal experiences. That is often the best way to look at these pieces and extract something from each of the varied layers. I remember Nathan would call this style his “modern petroglyph” series. They are pieces that are stone polished and then painted with variety of geometric designs and the “splatter” of the clay. They were meant to have the idea of ancient designs but modernized. The green on his pieces is always distinctive (the green is a clay high in copper) and this jar has both clay slips and silver lusture to create the designs. The inside of the neck is polished with a red clay and the rim is textured. This is one of those “iconic” pieces by Nathan that still feel ahead of their time in colors and combination of historic and modern appearances. The jar is signed on the bottom, “Nathan Begay ’99”. It is in excellent condition with no chips, cracks, restoration or repair.
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Begaye, Nathan (1958-2010)
Nathan Begaye was a unique innovator among Pueblo and Navajo potters. His ethnic connection to both Hopi and Navajo let his work flow between the two distinctive styles and yet find their own unique space. His work used traditional designs, forms, and techniques, yet somehow appeared very modern. Nathan was one of the innovators of Native pottery and was featured in numerous books, including "Free Spirit: The New Native American Indian Potter", "Beyond Traditions" and others. His pottery can also be found in the permanent collection of the Heard and other museums.