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Chris Teller, Isleta, A grey on white wedding vase with a twisted bridge and decorated with a two-panel feather and geometric design
Isleta
$ 650
cjle5b191
A grey on white wedding vase with a twisted bridge and decorated with a two-panel feather and geometric design
6 in L by 6.25 in W by 11 in H
Condition: Very good
Signature: C. Teller Isleta, N.M.
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Chris Teller
Isleta
Chris Teller was born into Isleta Pueblo in January, 1956. Her parents were Stella Teller and Louis Teller. She grew up watching and working with her mother making pottery. Chris was showing her own pottery at Santa Fe Indian Market before she was 30.
Chris makes polychrome jars and bowls but seems to prefer making figures: storytellers, nativities and sculptures. Like her mother she usually paints her storytellers with sleeping eyes. The grandmothers and babies are often singing. Some of them wear their hair in Hopi whorls. Many of them are sitting with their legs crossed. All of them will make you smile.
Isleta Pueblo
San Agustin de la Isletas Mission
Isleta Pueblo is said to have been founded in the 1300s. Archaeologists have put forth various ideas as to where the people came from with some scholars saying they migrated north from Mogollon/Mimbres settlements to the south while others say they migrated southeastward from either Chaco Canyon in the 1100s and 1200s or from the Four Corners area in the 1200s and 1300s. Their Tiwa language is shared with nearby Sandia Pueblo and a very similar tongue is spoken to the north at Taos and Picuris Pueblos. The two dialects are sometimes referred to as Southern and Northern Tiwa.
In 1540, when Coronado passed by, there were 15 major and minor Tiwa pueblos in the Middle Rio Grande area, and he seems to have attacked every one of them, looking for food and gold. By 1598, when Don Juan de Oñaté came north to conquer and occupy Nuevo Mexico, he found only Isleta and Alameda (Sandia) left. The others had all succumbed to European diseases introduced to them 60 years before, diseases they had no immunity to.
When the Franciscan priests arrived in the area (with de Oñatéin 1598 CE) they named the pueblo "Isleta" (meaning: island). The residents were relatively accommodating to the Spanish priests when compared to the reception the same priests got in other areas of Nuevo Mexico (making Isleta something of an "island of safety" for the Spanish in an ocean of hostility). When the Pueblo Revolt of 1680 happened, Isleta either couldn't or wouldn't participate in the rebellion. When the Spanish governor left Santa Fe he went to Albuquerque first, then to Isleta, and gathered his priests and troops. None wanted to go back north to fight so when they left and headed south, many Isletans went south to the El Paso area with them. Others fled to the Hopi settlements in Arizona and returned after the fighting was clearly over, many with Hopi spouses. When the Spanish returned in 1682 they found the Isleta mission church burned and the main structure was being used as a livestock pen. When the Spanish returned in force in 1692 they found Isleta completely empty and burned. The governor ordered the pueblo be rebuilt and resettled so residents were brought in from Taos and Picuris to the north and from Ysleta del Sur to the south, near El Paso. By 1720 a new, grander mission had been rebuilt on the foundations of the first.
Over the next century dissident members of the Laguna and Acoma Pueblo communities migrated to Isleta. While they were welcomed into the main Isleta pueblo at first, friction developed over the years until in the late 1800s, the small communities of Oraibi and Chicale were established. Most of the newcomers moved to one or the other.
The advent of the railroad in New Mexico was almost the end of the Isleta community as so many of the men went to work for the railroad. While the remaining residents managed to hold on to some of their social and religious practices, other elements of their culture almost disappeared, pottery making being one of those traditions that barely survived.
Today, making pottery the traditional way is practiced by only a few potters and their close family members.
The Story of
the Wedding Vase
as told by Teresita Naranjo of Santa Clara Pueblo
Helen Naha
Hopi
Wilma Baca Tosa
Jemez Pueblo
Margaret Tafoya
Santa Clara Pueblo
The Wedding Vase has been used for a long, long time in Indian Wedding Ceremonies.
After a period of courtship, when a boy and girl decide to get married, they cannot do so until certain customs have been observed. The boy must first call all his relatives together to tell them that he desires to be married to a certain girl. If the relatives agree, two or three of the oldest men are chosen to call on the parents of the girl. They pray according to Indian custom and the oldest man will tell the parents of the girl what their purpose is in visiting. The girl's parents never give a definite answer at this time, but just say that they will let the boy's family know their decision later.
About a week later, the girl calls a meeting of her relatives. The family then decides what answer should be given. If the answer is “no” that is the end of it. If the answer is “yes” then the oldest men in her family are delegated to go to the boy's home, and to give the answer, and to tell the boy on what day he can come to receive his bride-to-be. The boy must also notify all of his relatives on what day the girl will receive him, so that they will be able to have gifts for the girl.
Now the boy must find a Godmother and Godfather. The Godmother immediately starts making the wedding vase so that it will be finished by the time the girl is to be received. The Godmother also takes some of the stones which have been designated as holy and dips them into water, to make it holy water. It is with this holy water that the vase is filled on the day of the reception.
The reception day finally comes and the Godmother and Godfather lead the procession of the boy's relatives to the home of the girl. The groom is the last in line and must stand at the door of the bride's home until the gifts his relatives have brought have been opened and received by the bride.
The bride and groom now kneel in the middle of the room with the groom's relatives and the bride's parents praying all around them. The bride then gives her squash blossom necklace to the groom's oldest male relative, while the groom gives his necklace to the bride's oldest male relative. After each man has prayed, the groom's necklace is placed on the bride, and the bride's is likewise placed on the groom.
After the exchange of squash blossom necklaces and prayers, the Godmother places the wedding vase in front of the bride and groom. The bride drinks out of one side of the wedding vase and the groom drinks from the other. Then, the vase is passed to all in the room, with the women all drinking from the bride's side, and the men from the groom's.
After the ritual drinking of the holy water and the prayers, the bride's family feeds all the groom's relatives and a date is set for the church wedding. The wedding vase is now put aside until after the church wedding.
Once the church wedding ceremony has occurred, the wedding vase is filled with any drink the family may wish. Once again, all the family drinks in the traditional manner, with women drinking from one side, and men the other. Having served its ceremonial purpose, the wedding vase is given to the young newlyweds as a good luck piece.
Teller Family Tree
Disclaimer: This "family tree" is a best effort on our part to determine who the potters are in this family and arrange them in a generational order. The general information available is questionable so we have tried to show each of these diagrams to living members of each family to get their input and approval, too. This diagram is subject to change should we get better info.
- Marcellina Jojola (c. 1860s-)
- Emily Lente Carpio (c. 1880s-)
- Felecita Jojola (c. 1900s-) & Rudy Jojola
- Stella Teller (1929-) and Louis Teller
- Chris Teller Lucero (1956-)
- Marie (Robin) Teller Velardez (1954-) and Ray Velardez
- Lesley Teller Velardez (1973-)
- Mona Blythe Teller (1960-)
- Christopher Teller
- Nicol Teller Blythe (1978-)
- Lynette Teller (1963-)
- Stella Teller (1929-) and Louis Teller
- Felecita Jojola (c. 1900s-) & Rudy Jojola
Some of the above info is drawn from Southern Pueblo Pottery, 2000 Artist Biographies, by Gregory Schaaf, © 2002, Center for Indigenous Arts & Studies
Other info is derived from personal contacts with family members and through interminable searches of the Internet and cross-examination of the data found.
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