Lucy McKelvey

Dance of the Longbody

16 1/2" H x 6 1/2" W


The following is a description provided by Lucy's husband:

The design of this pot is taken from the sandpaintings of the Mountainway Chant. It is a beautiful ceremony that is performed in the fall and winter and is used to cure illnesses of patients that have sicknesses attributed to mountain animals, arthritis, and mental disorders.

On the last nigh of this chant there is a big public performance all night long in a circular coral of evergreens that is lit by huge bonfires. Mud-dabbed wild, and comical clowns light the fire with torches while doing magic arrow swallowing tricks and entertaining with their crazy comical antics. Afterwards, all night long there is a huge variety of songs and dances, skits and all kinds of magic. There are Yeibichai dancers (Navajo masked dancers representing various gods), Ribbon and Feather Dances done by ideal Navajo youth, bear skits, even dancing eagle feathers that dance out of baskets to the rhythm of the singing and drumming. The drumming is done on inverted ceremonial baskets with drum sticks made by large yucca leaves.

The curving, almost dancing Long Body Goddesses depicted on this pot are so tall that their heads almost bump the rainbows and clouds above them. These goddesses give humans the permission for them to have this chant. There bodies are so tall that it takes four skirts of fire, with the top three being made of red leather, to cover their bodies. The skirts are of the style of the Plains Indians because part of this ceremony was adapted from the Jicarilla Apaches who are the relatives of the Navajos and who are from the same language group.

The designing on the top three skirts on each goddess are designs done in porcupine quill embroidering like those of the Apache. The bottom skirt is a woven skirt like that of the Navajo. The designs on the skirts or kilts depict clouds, lightening, rainbows, and storm patterns. Around the shoulders of the goddesses hang weasel skinned fur collars. The headdresses are the feathered headdresses of the Mountainway Chant. The goddesses have cloud bangs and rainbow hair. Their forearms are criss-crosses with zigzag male lightening. Attached to their sashes are tobacco pouches decorated also with designs of clouds, lightening, rainbows, with rain (fringes) and feathers. From the goddesses wrists and elbows hang rain streamers decorated with feathers and clouds.



Gallery Price: $3,500.00

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THE MAKING OF A MCKELVEY POT

The way that Lucy and Celinda make pottery is a long, tedious, and time-consuming process. Emphasis is on quality rather than quantity. The following is a very abbreviated version of how it is done.

Clay Preparation

The clay is usually mined under big overhanging sandstone cliffs usually near the tops of the mesas in many places throughout the Southwest. It us brought home and soaked in buckets of water for over a month and is screened through many mashes of screen with the final mash being as fine as cloth. Ground mica temper is mixed with it. After the final screening the soupy mixture of clay is poured on drying racks covered with sheets and allowed to dry to the right consistency to make pottery. Then it is stored in big plastic trash cans until it is made into pottery.

When they are ready to make pottery they beat and kneed the clay to remove air bubbles and to mix the white and red clays together in a secret way to make the marbleized pottery.

The Making of the Pots

The pots are usually started in the bottoms of open bowls and coiled up from there one coil at a time. The coils are put together by sliding and pinching the coils to the ones below and thinning them by pinching them between her fingers and scraping with gourd scrapers. Usually 4-7 pots at a time are worked on so that a coil or two can be added at a time and allowed to firm up while she is working on other pots. This drying between coils prevents the pots from collapsing when being worked on. Lucy is known for her unusually large size pots of many unique, and varied shapes, and for making handles and overlay on pots.

Smoothing, Slipping, Polishing, and Painting of the Pots.

When the pots are dried they are sanded with a series of sandpapers until they are finally sanded to a 320 grit. Next they are evened out so the top and bottom will be almost perfectly even. The pot is then measured out and the basic background is drawn on with a pencil. The background is slipped with water and stone polished and then the various other clay slips are applied three times and stone polished one color at a time. Finally the black paint is made by grinding the hematite paint mixed with the juice of bee plant on a sandstone pallet. This grinding takes about one and a half hours of hard work to grind a days worth of paint. Then the black paint is then painted on the pot.

Firing the Pots

The pots are fired outside in a fire of Sheep manure and cedar wood. They are protected from the fire by pot shards and burned off tin. Firing temperatures reach between 1800-1900 degrees F. Most of her pottery has a few firing blushes where the fire got extra hot. Pots fired outside usually have better and varied coloring and are shinier. However, firing in this manner is sometimes disheartening as the pots can break when a sudden gust of wind or rain comes up or if the fire heats unevenly. Also the pottery can under-fire if the manure is damp or has too much sand in it.

Final Statement

As you can see the making of their pots is a very long process. Lucy is basically self taught but received a little help from Hopi-Tewa friends. It has taken her 30 years to learn to make her beautiful pottery and is glad that all of her daughters are fine potters in their own right and that one of them is taking it up as a career even though she has a college degree. She has been trying to make Navajo pottery evolve up into a fine art going up and above tradition while still using native techniques and home refined materials that are all natural. Most of the designs are adapted from Navajo sand painting designs, rug and basket designs, and the ancient pottery designs from the ancient ruins that are so numerous in the area the she grew up in.

More About the Artist:

Education: -Brigham Young University Provo, Utah
B.S. In Elementary Education and Indian Studies

Tribe: Navajo with some Hopi-Tewa ancestry

Clan: Tlashchi’i (Red Bottom) born for Todichi’ni (Bitter Water)

Work Experience: - 9 years teaching on the Navajo Reservation at various places, kindergarten, grades 2nd, 3rd, and junior high school art.

-Various artists in residence at elementary schools in the Four Corners area

-19 years as a professional full time potter

Shows & Exhibitions and Collections:

Santa Fe Indian Market (29 years)
Heard Museum
Eight Northern Pueblos
Gallup Ceremonial
Denver Museum of Natural History Collection
Dallas Indian Festival of Arts
Totah Festival
Eitljorg Museum Show
San Diego Museum of Man Collection
Southwest Museum, Los Angeles
Red Earth Festival, Oklahoma City
Indian Artists of America, Scottsdale
Pueblo Grande Show, Phoenix
Raymond James Financial Institution
Smithsonian Collection
Heard Museum Collection
Albuquerque LDS Temple
Lane Allen Collection Smithsonian Collection

Featured Publications: Pueblo and Navajo Contemporary Pottery by Guy Berger & Nancy Schiffer 2000,2004

Treasures of the Navajo by Theda Bassman 1997

Native Peoples 1992 (cover and article)

 Enduring Traditions by Jerry &Lois Jacka 1994

“Indian Trader” Oct. 1992

“Gallup Independent” Sept. 13, 1992

“Arizona Highways” Nov. 1988

Indian Market supplement to the Albuquerque Journal. August, 2002

 Beyond Tradition by Jerry & Lois Jacka 1988

Navajo Pottery by Russell Hartman & Jan Mesial 1987

Honors, Awards, & Accomplishments:

- 35 years making pottery, 19 years full time.

- Numerous awards at Santa Fe Indian Market, Gallup Ceremonial, Heard Museum (Maria Martinez Memorial Award), Totah Festival, Dallas Indian Market, Southwest Museum in Los Angeles, Navajo Tribal Fair, New Mexico State Fair, Best of Show Totah Festival, Farmington, NM

Influences: The ceremonies and traditional teachings of my grandfather and of my great-grandmother who partially raised me. Also the pottery from the ancient ruins near my home and my many Pueblo friends who inspired me, and quite possibly some of my Hopi-Tewa ancestry.

Artist Statement: I am mostly a self-taught potter who has spent 35 years refining the art of Navajo pottery up and beyond tradition but still using traditional materials and methods.

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