Youngblood, Nancy – 14″ Wide 64 Rib “S” Swirl Melon Bowl
$ 48,000.00
WOW! This is the largest piece we have ever had by Nancy Youngblood. It is extraordinary in size and complexity. It is not just the size AND the 64 ribs, but also that they are in an “S” swirl. Nancy does not make many of the 64 rib pieces as they are time-consuming in the carving and polishing. First, there is carving to create symmetry in each rib. The polishing was time-consuming, and she actually had to have Joseph (her son) hold it while she was polishing and going back and forth on each rib. When you consider a piece like this, that the ribs each have two sides, there is a lot of surface area to be polished. Take a moment and look at the photo of the top of the bowl. It gives you a sense of the symmetry of the piece, and the polish! Nancy has a particular polishing stone that allows her to polish deep on the sides of each rib. Consider as well that the polishing on this piece takes an extraordinary amount of time. Each rib has two “sides” to be polished and the surface area of the piece is about double its size! Each rib ends at a small “point” on the mouth of the piece. Again, so many opportunities for it to chip or crack during the carving or polishing. The bowl is amazing when held, as with the depth of the ribs, it almost feels as if it is floating in your hands! Nancy has won numerous awards for her melon bowls and this is undoubtedly a visual and technical classic of her style. It is signed on the bottom in the clay, “Nancy Youngblood”. The last photos are of the bowl being fired as well as when it was being polished (the photo with her dog!).
Nancy said of her sixty-four ribbed pieces:
“I haven’t done that many of these with the sixty-four ribs because it’s a lot of surface area to polish. I always want to technically challenge myself. The only way I can do that is to carve something and say, “I wonder if I could polish that” and then sit down and see if I can. You can see how the light catches each rib equally. It tells me that I got those ribs just right.” Nancy Youngblood, Spoken Through Clay
Out of stock
WOW! This is the largest piece we have ever had by Nancy Youngblood. It is extraordinary in size and complexity. It is not just the size AND the 64 ribs, but also that they are in an “S” swirl. Nancy does not make many of the 64 rib pieces as they are time-consuming in the carving and polishing. First, there is carving to create symmetry in each rib. The polishing was time-consuming, and she actually had to have Joseph (her son) hold it while she was polishing and going back and forth on each rib. When you consider on a piece like this that the ribs each have two sides, there is a lot of surface area to be polished. Take a moment and look at the photo of the top of the bowl. I tried to take the photo to show the depth of the ribs and their symmetry. Nancy has a particular polishing stone that allows her to polish deep on the sides of each rib. Consider as well that the polishing on this piece takes an extraordinary amount of time. Each rib has two “sides” to be polished and the surface area of the piece is about double its size! Each rib ends at a small “point” on the mouth of the piece. Again, so many opportunities for it to chip or crack during the carving or polishing. The bowl is amazing when held, as with the depth of the ribs, it almost feels as if it is floating in your hands! Nancy has won numerous awards for her melon bowls and this is undoubtedly a visual and technical classic of her style. It is signed on the bottom in the clay, “Nancy Youngblood”. The last photos are of the bowl being fired as well as when it was being polished (the photo with her dog!).
Nancy said of her sixty-four ribbed pieces:
“I haven’t done that many of these with the sixty-four ribs because it’s a lot of surface area to polish. I always want to technically challenge myself. The only way I can do that is to carve something and say, “I wonder if I could polish that” and then sit down and see if I can. You can see how the light catches each rib equally. It tells me that I got those ribs just right.” Nancy Youngblood, Spoken Through Clay
