This special piece was fired
using a less common color of clay that turns a soft mauve color
when fired. These pieces are extremely rare, and we are one of
the only galleries to receive these in the last few years.
This particular piece is an
absolutely amazing creation. It is really a special sight to
behold. If you've ever seen one of Iris' "mauve" pots
in person, then you know what we mean - and this is the top of
the lot. The shape, the color, and the flawlessness all combine
to present something extraordinary.
Iris Youvella Nampeyo is truly
a next-generation matriarch of Hopi pottery. She is the daughter
of the late Fannie Nampeyo, and grand-daughter to the legendary
Sikyatki renaissance potter - Nampeyo, and the rest of her family
pedigree reads like a Who's Who of Hopi pottery.
Iris maintains a clean and
classic approach to Hopi pottery making. Her natural colors lend
themselves well to the look and feel which she sets out to achieve.
There is nothing else quite like an Iris piece. The smooth and
flowing lines of the corn stalk not only represent her skill
as a delicate potter but her clan as well.
Iris spends many hours burnishing
her pottery by hand in the traditional fashion - using a smooth
polishing stone handed down for generations. She is very meticulous
in her attention to detail. Every inch is carefully gone over
to insure precise density and polish.
Her cornstalk motif is her
"trademark" design, and the vessel's non-uniform lip
is unique to her pieces. Everything is naturually fired - outdoors
in a sheep dung firing pit. Still she has mastered the ability
of achieving an even and consistent coloration throughout.
Iris appears in nearly every
major publication on Hopi pottery including Hopi-Tewa Pottery:
500 Artists Biographies by Gregory Schaff (p. 107), The
Art of the Hopi by Jerry and Lois Jacka (p. 121), Fourteen
Families in Pueblo Pottery by Rick Dillingham (p. 25), and
The Legacy of a Master Potter: Nampeyo and Her Descendants
by Mary Ellen and Laurence Blair (pp. 148, 236).
