Ceramics of Indigenous peoples of the Americas

[2] In preparing the clay, potters spend hours wedging it to remove air pockets and humidity that could easily cause it to explode during firing.

While the potter builds the coils up, she also blends them together until there was no trace of the ropes of clay entwined to form the pot, no deviation in the thickness of the walls, and therefore no weaknesses.

Hohokam potters and their descendants in the American Southwest employed the paddle-and-anvil technique, in which the interior clay wall of a pot was supported by an anvil, while the exterior was beaten with a paddle, smoothing the surface.

[5] Slips can be applied overall in washes, creating large color fields, often with cloth, or they can be painted in fine detail with brushes.

Yucca leaves, chewed slightly to loosen fibers, make excellent brushes that are still in use today in the American Southwest.

Cords, textiles, baskets, and corncobs have been rolled over wet clay, both as a decoration and to improve heat dispersion in cooking pots.

In pit-firing, the pot is placed in a shallow pit dug into the earth along with other unfired pottery, covered with wood and brush, or dung, then set on fire whereupon it can harden at temperatures of 1400 degrees or more.

[15] Locally produced ceramics of the Lucayan people in the Bahamas were characterized by crushed conch shell tempering, as opposed to the quartz sand-tempered ware imported from Hispaniola.

[clarification needed] Fiber-tempered ceramics associated with shell middens left by Late Archaic hunter-fisher-gatherers appeared in the Atlantic coastal plain of Florida, Georgia and South Carolina starting in 2500 BC.

Paiute and Washoe people in the western Great Basin developed plain, utilitarian ceramics separately, which was not burnished but occasionally featured red painted designs.

Its forms, styles, and functions vary widely across time and geographic location, yet the art of pottery production played a crucial role in both daily life and ceremonial practices for the Mesoamerican peoples.

The production and use of pottery in the western hemisphere is thought to have originated in central South America, eventually moving northwards.

[46] Over time, Olmec pottery techniques were picked up by neighboring cultures, helping to shape the artistic styles of the Maya, Mixtecs, and other Mesoamerican societies.

The figurines vary in appearance, with different poses, clothing, and headdresses that likely had symbolic meaning, possibly tied to familial lineage or social status.

[50] The spread of these ceramic items illustrates the interregional connections that existed within Mesoamerica, as well as the role of pottery in facilitating cultural interaction and exchange.

Barrancoid trade wares, of a style that had developed in the Orinoco River valley around 1000 BC, have been found in the southernmost Antilles; Trinidad, Tobago, and Saint Vincent.

[37][54][55] Ráquira, a town in the Boyacá Department, Colombia, is a major ceramics center, where both indigenous techniques and those introduced by Europeans are employed to create primarily utilitarian pots based on Chibcha designs.

Early ceramics have been found on the central coast at the large settlement of Las Haldas, at Huarmey, as well as at some other sites in the Casma River region, and in Lima area.

[59] Chavín potters (900–200 BC) on the Peruvian coast created distinctive stirrup spout vessels, both incised and highly burnished.

Paints, made with an acacia resin binder, were commonly warm yellow, olive green, red-orange, white, and black in color.

Paracas artists built upon Chavín styles and introduced the double spout-and-bridge vessel and distinctive masks portraying a supernatural "Oculate Being," that combines human, owl, and double-headed snake forms.

They created thirteen distinct colors, the larger palette found in Pre-Columbian ceramics in the Americas, which included rare pale purple, maroon, and bluish-grey.

Nasca artists created ceremonial and utilitarian bowls and beakers, effigy jars, panpipes, and vessels of new designs, including the stepped-fret.

[63] Dominating Peru's north coast from 1–600 CE, the Moche culture excelled at the art of ceramics, which was characterized by symbolic, religious imagery.

[71] Chancay ceramics, from the central coast, featured black-on-white designs on unique shapes, such as female effigies or elongated, oval jars.

The precontact ceramic tradition of the Gran Chaco was dramatically transformed under European colonization, which created a demand for pitchers, cups, and other introduced pottery forms.

[77] Tobatí, a city near Asunción, Paraguay, is renowned for its ceramics, including tiles and female effigy jars, known as Las gorgas.

The Museo del Barro, "Museum of Clay," in Asunción features pottery from the Gran Chaco, from Pre-Columbian Guaraní to contemporary mestizo ceramics.

Ceramics from the Taperinha site near Santarém, Brazil date back to 5130 BCE and include sand-tempered bowls and cooking vessels resembling gourds.

Other ancient Amazonian ceramic traditions, Mina and Uruá-Tucumã featured shell- and sand-tempered pottery, that was occasionally painted red.