This large effigy is more pot than bird, perhaps the image of a flightless Hopi penguin. It joins three other avian effigies in this collection: 1) 2019-06 by Michael Hawley, who was not Native, 2) 2020-08 by Bobbie Silas and 3) 2016-09 by Rachael Sahmie, Jean’s sister. The Hawley and Silas examples were coal-fired and attempted to recreate ancient Sikyatki examples. Rachael’s bird is also a copy of an ancient Sikyatki example, but it was dug-fired in the Sikyatki Revival tradition. Jean’s effigy 2025-03 breaks from these other examples. It is substantially larger and has a unique shape and design, a testimony to Jean’s mastery of her craft.
Form:
This is not just a pot with added avian elements; it is an integrated form with visual integrity. Three of the four avian characteristics emerge at the waist of the vessel. I surmise that Jean first constructed a simple bowl, added the solid flat wings and tail to its rim, then placed short coils of clay about 0.75-inches tall between these added forms. An additional coil of clay was then laid around the circumference of the pot over these additions. The solid point of the head was then formed from a short piece of clay with a neck added having a hollow center. A hole was then cut in the front coils of the pot and the head and neck inserted. Thus the neck and head emerge from the vessel a bit higher up than the other added elements. From the inside of the vessel only the addition of the neck is clearly visible, though the internal junctures where the wings and tail are attached are more abrupt than the sections of the pot where the walls of the lower bowl simply continue rising without interruption.
Just above the level of the wings and tail, the surface of the vessel gently rises about 1.5-inches and then more-steeply another 2-inches to the 3.75-inch- wide rim. That’s a lot of manipulation to create one form, but from the outside the pot is seamless.The simple lower bowl is well-formed and, in spite of the fact that the curves above and below each protrusion have different slopes, the junctures between the bowl surface and the protrusions are smooth and gentle. The head and neck extend 2-inches from the body. The neck widens to 1.75-inches as it joins the body.The wings are about 4.5-inches wide at their widest and 1-inch deep. The tail is about 2.75-inches wide and 1.75-inches long.
The 2-inch flat bottom is unpainted and displays a corn plant, denoting Jean’s clan, the usual “J” cypher for her name, and the words “Sak’Honsee,” Tewa for “Tobacco Flower Girl.”
Design:
Unusually there are three sets of thin framing lines on the vessel instead of the expected two sets. One set encircles the lip of the jar and one set encircles the flat bottom. The middle set encircles the effigy 0.75-inches below the wings. Below this middle set of framing lines the pot is painted a solid red. All the framing lines have line breaks, the top and bottom sets at about midway on the left side of the effigy; the middle set has a gap under the head of the effigy.
The head of the bird has a distinctive downward form, the black jaws of the beak separated by a slightly open mouth. A fraction of an inch behind the beak a single line encircles the head. The head is almost all stripes. Centered on the top of the head behind the beak, a black stripe begins at the encircling line and flairs as it reaches the base of the neck. It is flanked by two red stripes, pointed at the front of the head and widening as they extend to the rear. Below is an unpainted stripe; embedded in it is the black dot of an eye with a 0.3125-inch line emerging towards the rear. Unseen unless the vessel is turned upside-down, the throat is an unpainted polygon speckled with 45 black dots. Flanking this polygon are stripes with black, unpainted and red sections in sequence.
The base of the neck is marked with another single thin line. Emerging from this line at the top of the neck are two realistic feathers that flair over the unpainted shoulder of the bird. They are internally-divided into three feather-like shapes: two parallel stippled lens shapes are positioned at the base of the feather, with a black residual lens shape forming the feather’s point.
Along the sides of the bird, arching between the base of the neck down the length of the body to the base of the tail, are two sets of thin parallel lines (“one-lane highways”). They define a boat-shaped space with a width of 1.5-inches. Along the upper set of lines are 29 carefully-spaced black dots. Centered in this boat-like space are two wide and vertical red stripes separated by another thin one-lane “highway.” On either side of these red stripes are complex panels of design.
The panel on the side of the bird near the head I will designate the “front section;” the panel near the tail is the “rear section.” The two sections display the same patterns of design, except that 1) they have opposite orientations, and 2) a design element in the front section is truncated by that thin ring around the neck. Near the tail, the rear section features an unpainted diamond shape. It is surrounded by a large, black, tear-drop element, its curved edge pointing toward the front. The residual space between this black form and the central red stripes is roughly U-shaped and is stippled with brown (or thin black) paint. Because the front panel is truncated, the unpainted element near the neck forms a rear-pointing isosceles triangle rather than a diamond shape. Otherwise it has the same pattern of design as the rear panel, though with the reverse orientation.
Pendant from this body design is a boat-shaped design on the wings. The curved “bow” of the boat faces forward. Emerging obliquely from the point of the bow is a tear-dropped black form. Surrounding it is a swarm of black dots, 34 on the left wing and 62 on the right wing. The rear of the wing is defined by three backward pointing isosceles-triangle feathers of differing widths. The widest triangle is closest to the body and the thinest on the edge of the wing, its lower boundary curved by the form of the wing. These feather-like forms are stippled.
The base of the tail is marked by a fringe of five black hills [or “gumdrops”]. Behind it is a panel consisting of five black rectangles separated by thin unpainted one-lane highways. Then a wide, horizontal, one-lane highway is followed by the same two wide and vertical red stripes that we saw on the sides of the bird. Flanking these stripes is a two-element panel consisting of an unpainted square above a black element. This black element is blade-shaped to conform to the rounded end of the tail.
Design Analysis:
At first impression this is a chubby, pot-bellied bird. Friendship takes patience, however, and some time with this critter increases my admiration for Jean’s work. If my forensic ceramic analysis has merit, it seems like effigy 2025-03 began life as a simple low bowl to which Jean added wings, a tail and then a head and neck as she coiled upward toward the rim of the jar. These features flow organically from the pot, a complex, integrated, form with a surface that gracefully transforms from one plane to another. Svelte it is not, but an exceptional form of the potter’s craft it is.
The simple bowl that forms the base of the effigy continues up until the point where the wings and tail are attached, Jean has painted the pot with three sets of framing lines to fool the eye. The middle framing lines are drawn an inch below the waist. This demarkation point is visually reinforced by leaving the background of the area above these lines tan and painting the area below red.. Thus the unity of the tan avian form, both above and below the waist, is emphasized by this middle set of framing lines. The bird seems to be sitting on a red nest. The physical division of the form is different than the painting, but a viewer’s eye sees the division set by the middle framing lines, making the image of the bird larger.
In order to unify the pattern, to an unusual degree Jean has repeated elements and linked patterns of design. The design is mostly feathers, and all these feathers (and even those little lines from the eyes) sweep backward, an uplifting motif for a bird effigy. The top of the head and the tail both display linear designs.The same pair of broad red bands marks the two sides of the bird and also its tail. Look at the photograph of the top view of the effigy [first photograph in the second row, above] and you will see how the two red stripes on the head are part of this color pattern. As a result, a viewer sees red elements on all sides of the design and this pattern increases coherence.
Both major and minor elements are linked. The large black torpedo shapes thrusting towards each other on the pot’s sides integrate this panel and also provide a visual tension with the central vertical red stripes. The small black torpedo shape on the wing reflects the large black “torpedo” elements above. The rear black “torpedos” on the side panels thrust forward, as do the rear feathers on the wing below. The motif of small black dots along the top edge of the design on the body is repeated by the swarm of black dots on each wing and the unseen pattern of dots on the underside of the neck. The stippling in the design on the body is also reflective of the stippling on the wing. Delicate two-lane highways are found at four levels in the design and counter the heavy form of the effigy. Since the clay form thrusts out in many directions, the commonality of design elements and patterns of design are a centripetal force helping the bird visually adhere.
The only “errors” in painting I see are on the right wing where the lower edge of the top and bottom triangles have thicker black lines than necessary. I’d guess that Jean overpainted these lines, something she avoided on the left wing. It’s also noticeable that one wing carries almost twice as many black dots as the other wing.
One strength of a collection as large as this one is that it allows us to understand a single pot in the context of other pots by the artist. The mature Jean exploring inventive designs seems to be particularly sensitive to the relationship between form and design. The earliest pot by Jean in this collection is 2023-13, a simple face design in a bowl that is close to a reproduction of an ancient pot. Other Jean pots (cf 1992-10, 1999-08, 2008-10 and 2019-17) carry traditional Nampeyo family designs and fit the shape of the pots the way that tradition suggests. Form and design show each other off to advantage, but without innovation.
In contrast, pots carrying designs that are not part of the Nampeyo family tradition show the particular talent Jean had for fitting the design to the shape of a vessel. Bowl 1999-10 has about the same shape as her early bowl 2023-13, but in this case Jean has painted a very complex “shard” design inside the bowl. The design takes the lead here, without having to fight for attention from the simple form. Vase 2010-08 is a large jar of impressive diameter and height and Jean took advantage of this shape by decorating it with images that reach upward: corn and hands. For a wedding-vase shape that lacks such an upward thrust, Jean chose the ancient image of a “parrot maiden” who regally stands and presents herself on water-carrying vessel as a prayer for rain (2015-06). Finally, double-lobed canteen 2022-03 has the most complicated form of any pot in the collection and here Jean arranged her mother and maiden images to bridge the gap between the lobes and create perspective.
It’s the unusual shape of effigy 2025-03 that grabs a viewer’s attention: it’s a big bowl with things sticking out of it on all sides. Imagine what a cacophony of stimuli a viewer would experience if this unexpected shape had been painted with the shard design Jean used on bowl 1999-10. The complicated form would fight with the complicated design for the viewer’s attention. Instead, on effigy 2025-03 Jean chose patterned designs that display forward motion and coheres in multiple ways. The design helps bring unity to the form rather than competing with it.
Pots that she developed later in her career particularly display Jean’s mastery of her craft with their innovative form and design. Effigy 2025-03 is such a pot, and it justifies her winning the “Living Treasure of Arizona” Award in 2014. The judges judged wisely. Jean was born in 1948 and, after a long illness, passed on as a blessing in 2024.
