Jared Tso is one of the exciting young Native potters working today.  His new show, “History Became Legend.  Legend Became Myth” is a series of clay helmets inspired by the Lord of the Rings.  Jared grew up making his own helmets out of cardboard!  As Jared noted, “en-year-old Jared never thought he would be a full-time potter, let alone have a “Lord of the Rings” helmet-inspired show!   My mom had a rule when I was a kid she wouldn’t buy me any toy weapons. My imagination was unlimited and so I made them out of cardboard.”.

This piece is entitled, “Dine An-a-I“.   It is made from native clay and traditionally fired and then covered with pinon pitch.

Jared said of this piece:

“The inspiration for this is a conversation I had with my father.  When we went to the Bosque Redondo Reservation at Fort Sumter, where between 1863 and 1866, more than 10,000 Navajo (Diné) were forcibly removed in an event referred to as “The Long Walk”.   A lot of Dine say not to go back to that place.  My father said people misinterpreted that and said what was meant was that we shouldn’t go back to a time when Navajos worked against Navajos.  It is a story of how ideologies can divide us as a people and as a nation.  We should be aware of the ideologies that we carry and not let them become a divisive force.

I added the hair bun (Tsiiyéél)  so that people know this helmet is worn by a Navajo. The use of hair is connected to water. Water, no matter where it is in the world, is always changing; evaporating, flowing, raining, moving.  It is just like our thoughts.  For the Navajo, our hair is an extension of our thoughts, and always changing like water.  We tie our bun each day to continue to be aware of our thoughts.”

The piece is signed on the bottom, “Jared Tso”.  A museum mount is included with this piece.

“’ History became Legend.  Legend Became Myth” is a response to both the history and myths that are told about US expansion into the West.  The idea of Manifest Destiny is not only political but also an idea physically depicted in art.  Western landscape paintings or sculptures became a visual embodiment of the stereotypes of the period, with Native Americans often depicted as “the hostile” in contrast to the settlers.  It is not just in art, but this mythos can also be seen in maps, showing the increasing expansion of territory from East to West.  It is romanticized as both peaceful and divinely inspired.  Of course, this expansion came at the cost of the erasure of Native cultures and the destruction of millions of Native lives.”

“I have used the works of J.R.R. Tolkien and his Lord of the Rings Trilogy as a source of inspiration for these clay helmets.  They are a physical depiction of the story I want to tell.  In his books, Tolkien depicts a similar movement of East to West.   To me, in his books, the War of Ring reads like a post-apocalyptic story. Cities like Gondor or the world of the Elves are all diminished by the expansion of “evil”.  They become a fraction of their previous glory.  For us, Native Americans living today, we have already gone through our apocalypse and survived.  We are still here and ready to face what is to come.”   Jared Tso  2023