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Galleries in Santa Fe

The general architectural backdrop of Santa Fe - a rich terracotta adobe - sets pueblo pottery off perfectly. The town is one long series of visual juxtapositions, and the range of objects on display - from 'western rancho' to contemporary art - is at once stimulating and exhausting. There are galleries everywhere. 'Rancho de Chimayo Arts' is run by Sandra Martinez. She is keen to situate the pottery she sells within the continuum of a great historic pueblo tradition and like several other gallery directors I met, she used Rick Dillingham's 'Fourteen Families in Pueblo Pottery' to demonstrate the pedigree of her wares.⁴⁴ The book sat on the counter, open at the genealogical pages, where she had pencil-marked the diagrams to show how her potters are related to the old mistresses of the past. I listened while she expounded on the work of Cynthia Starflower.⁴⁵ It is brown and black, very rich, beautifully made, and costly.⁴⁶ Martinez emphasised the investment value of her wares - quite matter of factly pointing out that when Starflower dies (which could be soon) her work will shoot up in value. www.ranchodechimayo.com/SenaPlazawest faithfully extends both the look and the narrative of the gallery. However, the exchange system she offers, which seemed to be a strong inducement to customers, would be difficult to operate via the web site.⁴⁷

Canyon Road is where most of the better known, 'up-market' galleries are located, and many of them have web sites that I have visited. They are, without exception, spacious, cool and quiet, usually laid out in what is called 'South Western Style', and very often made of adobe. (See illustrations.) Pueblo Pottery is a feature of almost all, and there are some significant collections of historic pots by famous names.⁴⁸ Amongst the gallery directors that I spoke with there was general agreement that web sites function as an extension of the gallery display - a sort of virtual shop window. But few believed that 'serious' collectors would buy via the Internet alone. They are more likely to know the gallery personally, and to use the web site as a means of checking what is new on the market. As with Rancho de Chimayo, web site content is very close to that of the galleries themselves. At the Morning Star Gallery, for instance, I was able to find and photograph the very same Tesuque grain jar that I had admired on the Internet. (It was still there the last time I looked. See morningstargallery.com/cgi-bin/showInv.pl?i_Id=1319) The gallery director told me that photographs of pots were digitally enhanced for the web site, and suggested that this was common practice. Although there is very little perceptible difference between my photograph and the web site image, it was food for thought. No other gallery directors would admit to doing it however.

In terms of socio-political context and/or cultural issues, I found little in this immediate environment that reflected the busy discourse-rich virtual universe of the Internet. In Canyon Road, Native American culture is strenuously romanticised, as the (illustrated) larger than life statue of an Indian warrior, one of several such rampant characterisations, amply demonstrates. In the aesthetic oases of its galleries, history is a disinfected narrative populated by courageous frontiersmen, noble savages, beautiful maidens and wise old women potters. Like all roads however, this one has its select and - the further one walks - its not so select end. Here things are not so tidy, and a large painting on a not especially tasteful wall offers an alternative view. (See illustration.)

Wright's Indian Arts, Albuquerque

One sees very, very few Native Americans shopping in Canyon Road, and I had to leave Santa Fe before I found a gallery that acknowledged the historical complexity of contact and trade between Anglos and Indians. In sharp contrast to the exquisite adobe of Santa Fe galleries, Wright's Indian Arts in Albuquerque is situated in a modern shopping precinct. (See illustration.) I had been e-mailing with the assistant director, Judith Bennett, (hers was one of the 'voices' I had warmed to) and it was rather unsettling to meet her in the flesh. She too felt slightly strange at first. We discussed their web site www.wrightsgallery.com at length. Since they were in the process of updating it, I was able to observe exactly how they produced images and text. Their declared aim is to 'inform, educate, share.' All material is prepared in-house; Judith Bennet writes the text herself and photographs many of the pots in the back room of the gallery. Bennet agreed that touch - handling - is an essential part of appreciating artefacts, especially pueblo pottery, but like the gallery owners in Santa Fe, she felt that the web site was most likely to be used by individuals who had previously visited in person, and who brought a memory of 'real' touch to their virtual experience.

Surfing at home, I had placed the Wright's web site somewhere between démodé and 'retro' in style. Look at the decorative elements and the still life arrangements on the home page, where the images are shadowed, like pictures on a wall. The gallery itself has a distinctly art deco feel. This is due in part to the fact that Wright's Indian Art' began life as 'Wright's Trading Post' in 1907, and some of the original display cases are still in use (see illustrations). It is also because Wright's has only changed hands once since 1907, and thus has an unusually unbroken connection with its own history. After the first owner, Charles Wright, died in 1938, his wife Kathryn carried on the business until 1956, when she sold it to Marguerite and Sam Chernoff. It has remained in the Chernoff family since then, and the present director, Wayne Bobrick, is married to their daughter, Tania. Naturally Wright's exploits its position as the 'oldest Indian arts business in Albuquerque', both on the Internet and in the 'real' world.

Over 100 years ago, young Charles Wright of Kansas hitched up his team and rode off toward the Western sunset to seek his fortune. He set up the Indian Shop at Fred Harvey's hotels in Albuquerque and at the Grand Canyon, opened his own trading post on the Navajo reservation, and finally moved his family back to "civilization," starting Wright's Indian Trading Post & Curios, in downtown Albuquerque, in 1907.⁴⁹

As an article in 'ABQ arts' points out, concrete 'evidence of its colorful past remains.'⁵⁰ Hung in a prominent position (see illustration) the original Wright's signboard performs its semiotic duty for all to see. Its geometric motif is picked up on the web site, in the border of the home page.

Two of Charles Wright's diaries have survived and it is clear from his detailed commentaries that the 'family museum', a collection of pottery and other artefacts that is now displayed in the gallery, was built up systematically through contact with makers. Wright did not detach the objects he collected from their cultural context; he recognised that it endowed them with authenticity. Indeed, the more specific the context, the more valued the object. In 1914, of an 'Indian village....on the east bank of the Rio Grande', where he saw beadwork, wampum and turquoise, he wrote:

...they have retained many objects of Great interest to tourists and Students of Ethnology, objects of this nature are not Easily Purchased.⁵¹

A focus on the process of acquisition endures at Wright's, and sets it apart from the elegant galleries in Santa Fe. While other gallery directors tended to gloss over the particularities of trade, and whereas many web sites emphasise their intimacy with Native American makers, at Wright's there is considerable awareness and acknowledgement of cultural difference tinged with respect (even awe) for the Native American Other.⁵² Citing a well-known aphorism: 'scratch the suit and find the blanket', Judith Bennet did not feel that the relationship between Anglos and Indians had changed overmuch since Charles Wright first set up his trading post. Indeed, some of the practices that he initiated persevere. While I was there a man arrived to deliver two pieces of 'fetish' jewellery. He was one of their regular makers; we sat with him and discussed the significance of his work, its materials and symbolism. Wright's routinely advances money in return for artefacts, and the gallery's involvement with some pueblo families stretches back over many generations.

Conclusion

Nothing comes without its world....⁵³

Research in hyperspace is unsettling for its utter open-endedness. It is easy to fall into an infinite rhythm of surfing, e-mailing, evidence and analysis. In my case, the rhythm was interrupted by a 'real time' visit to New Mexico, and one way or another this essay has something of the travelogue about it. The terrain has been both real and virtual and I have discovered and discussed some of the links between the two, but much is left hanging unresolved. I set out to investigate the representation of pueblo pottery on the Internet, to interrogate the relationship between real and virtual objects, and to use the Internet as a research environment. It is a continuous, open-ended, interactive exploration. Interaction really does mean interaction: one gets caught up in the system. I am still electronically linked to, and exchanging views with, the individuals whose 'evidence' informs this study. Early on I attempted to 'situate' or 'locate' myself as an observer, but must now recognise that location is never static, always part of a process.

Location is not the concrete to the abstract of decontextualization. Location is the always partial, always finite, always fraught play of foreground and background, text and context, that constitutes critical enquiry.⁵⁴

What conclusions, if any, can be reached at this stage? For all its supposed hyper-democratic freedoms (universal access, no copyright laws etc.) the Internet belongs to those who have the means to manipulate it and when it comes to pueblo pottery, gallery owners construct and project the representations that best serve their interests. Although the sources of pueblo pottery web sites, like the web sites themselves, exist cheek-by-jowl with more contentious, politicised expressions of Native American culture, for the most part I found little traffic between the two in 'real time'. More familiarity with the arena - in both real and virtual form - more knowing where to look and what to look for, might well alter my perception. Meanwhile I notice that the web site of 'Wright's Indian Arts' has changed to include a 'shopping basket' facility: www.wrightsgallery.com/contact.php this only initiates a contact however, which may or may not lead to a purchase. It is a reminder though, of the shifting nature of hyperspace, where the 'evidence' is always (re)forming. Finally, what of the haptic - the sense of touch? Perhaps, like William Gibson's 'netrunner', tomorrow's surfers will somehow fuse with electronic media, so that the 'real' world fades away and they enjoy unmediated, multi-dimensional real consumption of virtual objects. Although that is still - just about - the province of science fiction, computer programmes already in development will offer touch as an integral aspect of the surfing experience. It will be fascinating to see how pueblo pottery web sites respond.