Lonnie Vigil is known for his use of micaceous clay and is one of a handful of potters from Nambe Pueblo.  He has taken this style of pottery and transformed it from utilitarian into fine art.  This is a classic jar with a wide shoulder and a short neck.  The bottom of the jar shows the coils as they were left exposed sitting in the puki (the bowl where potters start making their pottery).  The texture of the bottom is probably why he fired the piece with the blushes near the base. The jar was then traditionally fired and note the intense fire clouds on the shoulder and the color variations across the surface of the piece!  They are a dynamic range from black to almost white.  Lonnie’s refinement of micaceous pottery won him “Best of Show” at Santa Fe Indian Market in 1998.  This piece is signed, “Lonnie Vigil” and it is in excellent condition with no chips, cracks, restoration or repair.

Lonnie said of his pottery:

“The fire clouds are the result of the fuel touching the pottery. When we fire the pieces, we use cottonwood bark. The pottery doesn’t get fire clouded everywhere but just in certain places. It’s serendipitous they don’t happen all in the same place. This [jar was fired right side up].  You can tell because the fire clouding is on the bottom. Often they tell me how they want to sit in the fire. I can fire them upside down or right side up. Some of them are just tottering, so that means they want to be with their mouth to the fire.” Lonnie Vigil, Spoken Through Clay