Power of the People

POTTERY OF THE SAN ILDEFONSO PUEBLO IS A BEACON OF CREATIVITY AND EXPRESSION FUELED BY THE COMMUNAL STRENGTH OF ITS PEOPLE.

Pottery making is a prayer, pottery making is creating life. Pottery, too, has profound significance; the creation of pottery is the combining of two sacred and fertile substances—water and earth—combining them to make a new life. Designs on pottery are neither iconographic, metaphoric nor symbolic but rather become the form that is painted—a leaf form is a leaf, a painted feather is prayer or breath. Painting infuses pottery with sacredness. These arts are visual prayer.