Back when the stones were soft, my brother Jeff might say in his best Old Lodge Skins voice from Little Big Man, things were much simpler.

Among Native tribes in the Southwest, when The People needed something to carry something else, they made it out of the materials at-hand. First, there were tanned hides. If you needed a basket, there were willows near the stream you could cut, strip and weave. If you needed a pot to put over a fire to cook a venison stew, you sought out an arroyo where micaceous clay was exposed by flash floods, added water and shaped it into a vessel that was fired over a cedar wood flame.

As time progressed and the land was suddenly filled with other people who came here from far away lands, they brought with them the means to expand their skills to make other things. The introduction of churro sheep from the Spanish, for instance, led to a blanket weaving tradition among the Din people, along with the tradition of kilts, sashes and mantas among the Pueblos.

Artistry, however, evolved differently than it did for the foreign colonists. In many respects, the people who made useful objects baskets, pottery, clothing and other accoutrements were generally not accorded any particular status within the tribal group. They were simply people who developed the skills to make things successfully and functionally. And, the designs they might include with their work were often rooted in symbols that came from their ancient ceremonial life ways.

Yet, according to EncyclopaediaBritannica, within this rigid framework of tradition, there was sometimes a surprising degree of freedom of expression. There are recorded instances of individuals having made considerable changes in the art (and the economy) of their tribes. In North America, perhaps the most striking have been the careers of Nampey, the famed Hopi potter, and Mara Martnez and Julin Martnez, of San Ildefonso Pueblo.

The painters who discovered Taos at the turn of the 20th century soon encouraged others to come here. Those who made portraits hired local residents some Hispanic people, others from Taos Pueblo who posed for paintings that helped preserve a way of life they believed was fast disappearing.

"The artists of the Taos Society of Artists were inspired by the art and culture of Taos Pueblo," Davison Koenig, Couse-Sharp Historic Site executive director and curator, said in a 2018 Taos News story about an exhibit titled Full Circle: Taos Pueblo Contemporary. The charter of the TSA states that one of the reasons for its formation was "to promote and stimulate the practical expressions of art to preserve and promote the native art."

Koenig said many of the TSA artists developed lifelong friendships and even familial bonds with their Native models, who included Looking Elk, Hunting Son, Star Road, Elk Duststorm, Rain Coming Down and Elkfoot, to name a few. "TSA artists became strong advocates for Native rights and sovereignty," he adds. "The exhibition 'Full Circle' honors those relationships and the many artists from Taos Pueblo who continue to redefine Native art and identity."

These early relationships included sharing what the artists knew about making paintings, thus providing a brand new form of expression from a Native point of view. Until then, creative adornment of objects was rare. Native people had never made an artistic piece that existed only as something to look at and admire.

In the opening chapter of Pueblo Indian Painting: Tradition and Modernism in New Mexico, 1900-1930, author J.J. Brody writes of the connections artists in Santa Fe were making with young Pueblo Indians at about the same time.

In the year 1900, Esther Hoyt, a U.S. Indian Service teacher at San Ildefonso Pueblo Day School distributed watercolor paints and paper to her pupils and encouraged them to make pictures of Pueblo ceremonial dances. About fifteen years later some of these same young artists were selling paintings at or near the pueblo to Santa Fes art, anthropology and museum communities, and by 1917, artists from San Ildefonso and other pueblos were selling their work in Santa Fe itself.

On the one hand, anthropologists urged caution to colleagues with regard to interfering with the natural evolution of art as it was rapidly being embraced by Native people. Plus, many of the artists themselves were urged to exercise caution with regard to very strict concerns among some tribal kiva leaders. This went hand-in-hand with the ways photography was being used, mostly by outsiders, to record tribal ceremonies. Seemingly innocent at first, photography would become considered an unwelcome intrusion to where today it is banned at Pueblos such as Taos during public ceremonial dances.

On the other hand, these new artists flourished due to encouragement from outsiders eager to help, along with a budding tourism market. As the railroad brought more and more tourists and new residents to the Southwest, the growth of Native-made art has become one of the creative foundations in this region.

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Native American art: Form and function to singularity - The Taos News