REYES MADALENA Jemez Pueblo Mini Canteen Native American Leather Braid VTG 3”L

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REYES MADALENA Jemez Pueblo Mini Canteen Native American Leather Braid VTG 3”L:
$146.25

Reyes Madalena of the Jemez Pueblo NM Tribe Mini Canteen w/Leather Braid Strap Native American Vintage. Very nice quality clay and pattern. Excellent condition with no scratches or cracks. This item has been in storage by a collector of Native American arts.

3”L.x 2.5”Wx 2.25”D

Born in the late 1930’s, she grew up with the other Reservation kids calling her “white girl,” which made her dream “that someday I’m going to do something really Indian,” And, sure enough, she’s the only one of her childhood friends who became such an accomplished potter.

Madalena had the advantage of genetics on her side. Her maternal grandmother, Benina Medina Madalena from the Zia Reservation, had been an excellent potter, winning awards in the early 1920’s at the Santa Fe Indian Market. She was the one who essentially reintroduced the art to the Jemez Reservation, where the craftsmen had focused on other indigenous crafts.

Madalena created out of touch, not sight.

You can identify the physical reasons why her earthenware is so smooth, resists cracking and burnishes to such a splendid sheen. The connection Madalena has with the earth and her art is part of what makes her pottery so magic.

Both the designs and the types of pots she creates are also tied to the traditions of her Anasazi ancestry. Madalena uses different color clays to decorate the pots. She designs spontaneously on her pottery; however, she always incorporates certain familiar motifs that date back thousands of years and have well-established significance.

In addition to canteens and cooking pots, Madalena creates bells, wedding pots (which have two spouts, symbolizing the union of a couple) and gourd-shaped vessels. These are all useful items, particularly for an agrarian lifestyle, which is evidence that form blossomed out of function. Her decorative items, however, include storytellers, figurines and bells, favorites of many collectors.