Sanchez, Russell – Polychrome Jar with Bird, Snake, Sun and Waterfall Rim

6"w x 5"h

$ 7,200.00

Russell Sanchez continues to be one of the true innovators in Pueblo pottery.  Each piece is perfectly coil-built, stone polished, and etched.  This jar has a round shoulder and a short neck. The interior of the neck is fully polished and has a “waterfall rim”.  This is a style created by Russell with 16 ridges sculpted on the inside and fully polished.  It is more difficult to carve into the neck of the jar than on the exterior.  The body of the jar is etched with a design inspired by a jar by Ignacia Sanchez, Russell’s great-grandmother (see last photo).  This jar has a bird and snake with the sun and clouds around the neck of the ajr.  The white clay is stone polished to a high shine. The designs are etched into the clay before firing. Did you know that the black and red clay colors are pained into the etched areas BEFORE the jar is fired!  Russell said he had to paint them two to three times to get a strong tonality of coloration.  Note the clouds, which are stippled with clay and have a slight texture. Again, check out the last photo and see how Ignacia painted similar clouds. Russell’s polychrome work takes from earlier San Ildefonso pottery from the late 1800s with the use of the same clays but polishing them onto the surface.  The colorations of black, red, and white are all seen in San Ildefonso’s pottery from the 1880s to about 1920.  His deep red clay is another recent addition to his clay art starting around 2005.  As Russell continues to innovate from historic designs, he says, “Tradition means moving forward and adding to it. You keep moving forward.  If we stayed stagnant we would no longer exist.”  The jar has two bands of antique bronze beads, along with a band of copper leaf.  There are two bands of jet hei-shi beads on the bottom along with a checkerboard design.  The eyes of the snake and bird are set with hematite. The jar is signed on the bottom in the clay.  It is exciting to see how this imagery is not new but Russell’s reinterpretation of it both modernizes and revives.

Russell Sanchez: Contemporizing the Pueblo Pottery Past