Roxanne Swentzell facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Roxanne Swentzell
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For Life in all Directions, bronze sculpture by Roxanne Swentzell at National Museum of the American Indian
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| Born | December 9, 1962 Taos Pueblo, New Mexico, U.S.
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| Nationality | Santa Clara Pueblo, American |
| Education | Portland Museum of Art School, Institute of American Indian Arts |
| Known for | Ceramics, Sculpture |
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Notable work
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Mud Woman Rolls On (2011) |
| Movement | Pueblo ceramics |
Roxanne Swentzell (born December 9, 1962) is a Native American artist from the Santa Clara Pueblo in New Mexico. She is famous for her sculptures and pottery. She also works to promote traditional Indigenous foods and runs an art gallery. Her amazing artworks are displayed in many important museums and galleries around the world. She has also won many awards for her art.
Roxanne's art often talks about personal feelings and important social ideas. It shows her deep respect for family, her culture, and the Earth. Her sculptures have been shown in places like the White House. She has also been asked to create lasting artworks for the Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian and other museums.
Contents
Early Life and Family
Roxanne Swentzell was born in 1962 at Taos Pueblo, New Mexico. Her parents, Ralph and Rina Swentzell, really encouraged her interest in art. Her father was a philosophy professor. Her mother, Rina Swentzell, was an activist, architect, and artist from the Santa Clara Pueblo.
Roxanne comes from a long line of Santa Clara Pueblo potters. She learned traditional pottery methods from her family. She grew up watching her mother collect clay from the earth. Her mother would then create pots by hand-coiling and firing them in a pit.
Finding Her Voice Through Clay
Roxanne started playing with clay when she was a child. She made small figures to show her feelings. It was hard for her to talk because she had a speech impediment. So, she used leftover clay from her mother's projects to make sculptures. These small figures helped her share her emotions. Clay sculpture became her main way to communicate how she felt inside. Her teachers understood and supported her artistic journey.
Her Education
In 1978, Roxanne's parents sent her to the Institute of American Indian Arts (IAIA) in Santa Fe. Her first art show was at the IAIA Museum. After two years, she moved to the Portland Museum of Art School in 1980. She chose this school because it focused on drawing the human body.
However, Roxanne soon missed home. She also felt that artists in Portland separated their art from their daily lives. She felt their art did not show what was around them. But for Roxanne, her own art was inspired by her life experiences. She believes in learning new things every day. She once said, "Everyday is an amazing new book, a test in every discipline, a chance to advance myself, and great times on the playground."
Personal Life
Roxanne Swentzell taught both her children and grandchildren at home. Her son, Dr. Porter Swentzell, is a professor at the Institute of American Indian Arts. Her daughter, Rose B. Simpson, is also a well-known ceramic sculptor.
Roxanne lives in an adobe house that she built herself. It is located in the high-desert area of Santa Clara Pueblo. She has also designed and planted trees and gardens at her home. Her family takes part in the pueblo's traditional dances and feasts. Roxanne also grows her own food on her land.
Helping the Earth and Community
In 1987, Roxanne helped start a non-profit group called the Flowering Tree Permaculture Institute. She is the president of this group. The institute teaches people how to live in a healthy and sustainable way. It focuses on ecological design and farming methods that protect the Earth.
Classes at the institute teach things like farming, how to farm with little water in the desert, and building with adobe. Roxanne's work there is based on the wisdom of Native American ancestors. They were role models for protecting the Earth and preserving Indigenous knowledge about nature. Roxanne also created the Pueblo Food Experience. This program helps people learn about and eat foods that were available to the Tewa people before Europeans arrived.
Roxanne also runs the Tower Gallery. It is located on Pojoaque Pueblo in northern Santa Fe. She shows her own pottery and bronze work there. She also hosts art shows featuring other artists.
Her Amazing Artwork
Roxanne Swentzell's sculptures often show strong emotions from her own experiences. Most of her figures are female. They focus on topics like gender roles, identity, family, and the past.
Like traditional Pueblo pottery, Roxanne makes her clay figures by coiling clay. She uses commercially made clay, which is different from other Pueblo potters who dig and prepare their own clay. Roxanne says she is not worried about this. She believes that all clay, no matter where it comes from, is from the Earth. She forms the clay into thick coils to build the hollow figures. She keeps the clay wet for two to four days while coiling. She uses a knife or stone to smooth the coils. While her figures are hollow, the toes and fingers are solid. The finished sculptures are often painted and can have details like eyes, hair, or clothing.
Emergence of the Clowns
Roxanne's Santa Clara heritage can be seen in her Clown series. In Pueblo beliefs, a clown or koshare is a sacred being. They often teach important lessons through their actions.
Her sculpture Despairing Clown talks about losing one's identity. The clown looks sad as he peels off his stripes, showing the struggle to find oneself again. Emergence of the Clowns (1988) represents the Pueblo people coming into this world. Three figures in Emergence are partly human. They slowly lead to a final figure who is complete. Each partial figure shows feelings of amazement, knowledge, and wonder. The way the figures develop in Emergence also highlights the Pueblo people's journey upward.
In Crisis
Swentzell's In Crisis (1999) explores how media influences women's ideas of beauty and identity. The figure in this artwork seems aware of how media and pop culture affect her. She struggles to fight off these ideas of beauty by clawing her own hand. However, her brightly painted red fingernails also show the danger the media poses to her.
For Life in All Directions
Roxanne Swentzell created a permanent public art piece called For Life in All Directions (2004). The National Museum of the American Indian in Washington DC asked her to create it. It is made from bronze, coiled and hand-built pottery, and paint. You can see it in the foyer of the Elmer and Mary Louise Rasmuson Theater.
Nestled Lives
The University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology bought the sculpture Nestled Lives from Roxanne in 2000. It is displayed in their Native American Voices Gallery. The sculpture is made from clay. It shows a seated woman with her arms stretched out. She holds three nested bowls inside her stomach.
Roxanne made this piece when there were fires near Los Alamos, New Mexico. She was thinking about humans, especially women, as vessels or containers. She said, "I could see the land near my home burning... For Pueblo people, earth is our mother—earth itself is seen like a bowl. Nesting bowls are seen as a sign sort of like generations—the earth holds all of us, nestled within."
Awards and Honors
In 1984, Roxanne Swentzell first took part in the annual Santa Fe Indian Market. Two years later, she won eight awards for her sculptures and pottery shown at the market. She received the Market's Creative Excellence in Sculpture honor. In 2019, she was chosen to give the main speech at the graduation ceremony for the Institute of American Indian Arts.
Exhibitions
- White House, Washington, DC
- Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian
- Cartier, Paris
- Santa Fe Convention Center, Santa Fe, New Mexico
- Museum of Wellington, New Zealand
- Autry Museum of the American West, Los Angeles, CA
Collections
Her work is part of many important collections. These include the Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian, Cartier in Paris, the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa, and the Museum of Wellington in New Zealand. Other collections include the Brooklyn Museum, the Heard Museum, Denver Art Museum, Joslyn Art Museum, and Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art.
