I’m very pleased that after nearly 20 years, Yvonne Lucas has returned to make pottery!  These new pieces reflect a variety of her pottery and each piece is coil-built, stone polished with white clay, painted with bee-weed and clay slips and traditionally fired.  This jar is a classic shape with a round body and short neck. The white is stone polished and then painted with eight large flowers around the center of the piece. There are eight smaller ones above and eight smaller ones below.  The flowers are complex and visually dynamic.  It is a classic design with a slightly modernist approach.  The bowl was traditionally fired. There is just a slight bit of a blush from the firing.  The piece is signed, “Y. Lucas”.  

Yvonne has said of her pottery art:

“Am I a Laguna revivalist? I don’t think of myself as a revivalist. Nobody taught me from Laguna. My only tie is Evelyn Cheromiah. I’ve researched by looking at books and taking pictures of historic pots in museums. I pull different designs from the historic pots or just from my imagination. Sometimes, when I look at my pottery, I think, “I can’t believe I made this.”  Yvonne Lucas, Spoken Through Clay

Brand

Lucas, Yvonne (b. 1959)

Yvonne Lucas

Yvonne Lucas continues to create her own path in reviving historic Laguna Pottery. She is married to Steve Lucas, and learned to make pottery from him and his aunt, Dextra Quotskuyva Nampeyo. Yvonne is one of the only potters from Laguna still firing traditionally, and the color variations are stunning, with almost a pinkish, meringue-like cast to areas of the white. She has won numerous awards for her work and her pieces can be found in museums around the country.  Yvonne uses the traditional hand coil thin shelled pottery learned from Dextra, hand polishes, traditional colors, paint, and design.