A Nampeyo Showcase

Will the Real Nampeyo Pots Please Come Forward? Challenges of Attribution

This Nampeyo Gallery includes both pottery that is firmly identified as having been made by Nampeyo and other pieces that have been attributed to her. Nampeyo never signed her work, so the task of convincingly identifying her works can be daunting. The Nampeyo name appears on several ASM pots but written by other people and not as a signature. How this came to be is discussed below and referenced in the captions for the respective gallery photographs.

With her fame as a potter came an incentive for some collectors and dealers to identify Hopi pottery as Nampeyo’s, even if they had no supporting evidence. This tendency has only amplified through the years since her passing in 1942, as the monetary value of Nampeyo’s pottery has increased dramatically. 

The extant photographs of Nampeyo appearing with a varying array of pottery bowls and jars can assist with attributions. This is especially the case when a given pot is clearly visible. Unfortunately, no ASM Nampeyo pottery appears in any of the known historic Nampeyo photographs. It should be noted, however, that Nampeyo may not have formed and painted every pot that is shown with her. Some of the many photographers who took pictures of her may have choreographed the scenes according to compositional rather than documentary considerations. That some of these photos have depicted Nampeyo painting an already fired pot is among the more-obvious clues of staging.

Careful comparisons with well-documented examples of Nampeyo’s pottery, which were made alone or in collaboration, assessment of existing provenance information, and reliance upon curators, other scholars, and the ever-expanding literature on Nampeyo, have guided the process of identifying the works presented.

Nampeyo Family Collaborators

Because Nampeyo worked in tandem with relatives, especially as she aged and her eyesight declined, identifying her solo work can be a major challenge. (The timeframe for the progression of her loss of sight is not known exactly.) Beginning at least by the early 1900s, Nampeyo would form vessels, and the designs would be painted by her daughters Annie Healing, Fannie Lesou Polacca, and Nellie Lesou Douma, and later by her granddaughters Rachel Healing Namingha and Daisy Healing Naha Hooee, along with her neighbor Lena Charlie (whose father was a member of the Corn Clan, but was not directly related to Nampeyo), and perhaps others. 

Nampeyo’s husband, Lesso, more than likely also painted pots. This possible shared effort has been the source of considerable spirited discussion among Nampeyo scholars and enthusiasts through the years. So far, no pottery definitively known to have been painted by Lesso has emerged, although one vessel at the Denver Art Museum has his name penciled on its base. Nor are there any photographs that corroborate such a role. Hopi Edmund Nequatewa wrote, after Nampeyo’s death in 1942, that Lesso helped Nampeyo with her pottery and was a good painter: “He really was as good as his wife and should rightly get credit” (1943:42). Pottery making at Hopi, as in other Pueblo communities, is a family affair, so it is reasonable to assume that Lesso would have pitched in somehow. Nequatewa may have overstated Lesso’s skill, however. Given the extensive publicity that fellow Tewa potters Maria and Julian Martinez of San Ildefonso garnered while working as a couple, surely Lesso’s contributions would have received credit if he had been willing. 

Lesso’s descendants have commented on his pottery painting. Daughter Daisy Hooee was quoted by Rick Dillingham (1994:41) as saying: “Her [Nampeyo’s] husband Lesso, he helped – he sure could paint, that old man too.” And Lesso’s great-granddaughter Dextra Quotskuyva noted that “Lesso drew designs for Nampeyo to use based upon Sikyatki pottery being excavated, and because of this it confirmed he knew how to paint” (King 2017:35, 157). 

Lesso’s absence from the many photos of Nampeyo at work might be explained as either a marketing decision, hesitancy on Lesso’s part to be photographed engaging in a traditionally female occupation, or his reluctance to be photographed at all (see photo below of the family at the Grand Canyon, with Lesso’s back toward the photographer). He did agree to pose alone for several photographs by Adam Clark Vroman (Blair and Blair 1999:76). Lesso’s involvement in the Nampeyo family enterprise is a subject ripe for further investigation. However, it may prove challenging unless new information comes to light. 

The Nampeyo Imprimatur 

Selected examples of pottery in the ASM collection are signed with Nampeyo’s name or are otherwise labeled as Nampeyo’s in writing directly on the base. One jar has a paper label, identified as a Fred Harvey Company tag, which reads: “Made by Nampeyo-Hopi.” It is likely that her daughters, at times, signed their mother’s name to collaborative works, and traders and dealers may have as well. In one instance, a collector’s name, along with “Nampuya,” was written before firing onto the base of a jar (ASM #E-2273, discussed later). Through publication of these "signatures" on ASM vessels, it is hoped that researchers can gain further insight into the past practices of labeling Nampeyo’s pottery.

Ancestral Hopi Pottery 
Contributed by Dr. E. Charles Adams, 2000

Nampeyo is famous for her Sikyatki revival–style pottery. Sikyatki is the name of an enormous ancient Hopi village on the east flank of First Mesa that was abandoned about 1500. The abandonment of Sikyatki is said in Hopi oral tradition to have been due to a dispute with Walpi, whose descendants still reside on top of First Mesa, that resulted in the destruction of Sikyatki.

Sikyatki was partially excavated by Jesse Walter Fewkes of the Smithsonian Institution in 1895. His excavations focused on the Sikyatki cemetery areas as well as the rooms of the pueblo. Nampeyo visited the excavation with her husband, Lesso, and was inspired by the finely made, impeccably decorated pottery jars and bowls that were being removed. 

Fewkes noted Nampeyo and Lesso’s visits to his excavation:

"Nampeo [Nampeyo] and her husband, Lesou [Lesso], came to his [Fewkes’s] camp, borrowed paper and pencil, and copied many of the ancient symbols found on the pottery vessels unearthed, and these she has reproduced on pottery of her own manufacture many times since that date (Fewkes 1919:279n2)."

However, it is clear that Nampeyo was making innovative pottery based on ancient forms and designs before Fewkes’s work at Sikyatki. She was encouraged by Thomas Keam, who operated the trading post at what is now known as Keams Canyon beginning in 1875 (Blair and Blair 1999:33). The brilliantly painted pottery from Sikyatki continued to exert an influence on Nampeyo’s style throughout her life. The largely polychrome designs particularly emphasized highly stylized birds, especially macaws, although Sikyatki period potters employed a wide range of imagery. Unfortunately, the identities of any late-nineteenth-century potters, who also may well have possessed skill and creativity, are still largely unknown.

Nampeyo also drew inspiration from, and at times replicated, earlier ancestral Hopi pottery types, such as Jeddito and Awatovi Black-on-yellow, plus some of the earlier regional black-on-white traditions. In addition, some motifs found on these wares, dating around 1300–1500, are incorporated into the designs of later Sikyatki pottery.

Fewkes published several books on the pottery at Hopi, especially Sikyatki wares. These publications have since been reprinted from the original Bureau of American Ethnology series (see Bibliography). In these, he uses Hopi and his own classifications of the iconography to interpret the meaning of the designs.