Tesuque Pueblo Black-on-red Double-Spouted Jar with Lizard, Beetle

Native American, Tesuque Pueblo. A hand-built earthenware jar with two cylindrical spouts rising side by side from a globular body. The form recalls the Pueblo wedding vase, but the spouts stand free of each other, with no bridging strap between them. Instead a single loop handle, darkened with black paint, is set to one side, giving the piece something of the look of a pitcher that could not settle on one mouth. The burnt-orange slip carries black painted figures: a long-legged beetle climbs the rear spout, a crested lizard twists across the belly, and a small turtle crawls up the front neck. Other surfaces add further insects, reptiles, amphibians, and fanciful creatures, some of which may be mythic beasts. The rare form and the freely drawn creatures suggest a potter working inventively within the Tewa tradition. Tesuque is a Tewa-speaking pueblo a few miles north of Santa Fe, New Mexico. Its closeness to the town, and to the railroad that reached the region in 1880, made it one of the first pueblos to produce pottery for outside buyers. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Tesuque potters became best known for small seated "rain god" figures sold through Santa Fe curio dealers. Vessels from the same period often moved away from the older polychrome conventions toward lively, informal painted imagery meant to please visitors. The paired-spout vessel is best known as the Pueblo wedding vase, in which two spouts are joined by a bridging handle. Here the potter kept the twin spouts but replaced the bridge with an independent side handle. That hybrid form is seldom encountered and sits somewhere between the wedding vase and the pitcher. Lizards, turtles, frogs, and insects appear widely in Pueblo imagery and are often associated with water and the life of the land. On a vessel of this kind, though, they read as much as a playful bestiary as a statement of belief. A Certificate of Authenticity will accompany all winning bids. Item # 206133

Estimation:€359.43

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