Materials
Traditionally, the materials used by carvers were often indigenous to the region or procured by trade. The most important of these materials was turquoise which the Zuni regard as the sacred stone. Jet, shell (primarily mother-of-pearl), and coral are also frequently used. These materials and their associated colors are principle in the Zuni sunface, a cultural symbol which is present in Zuni jewelry and fetishes and represents their sun father. Other materials used are travertine or "Zuni rock", fishrock, jasper, pipestone, marble, or organic items such as fossilized ivory, bone, and deer or elk antler. Even artificial substances such as slag glass are used. But historically the most-used stone has been serpentine, a local soft stone found abundantly in the Zuni Mountains and also in Arizona In recent years Zuni carvings, or fetishes, have become popular collectibles and Zuni artisans have familiarized themselves with materials available from all parts of the world in order to serve the aesthetic tastes of collectors (McManis, 1998).
Read more about this topic: Zuni Fetishes
Famous quotes containing the word materials:
“In daily life what distinguishes the master is the using those materials he has, instead of looking about for what are more renowned, or what others have used well.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“In how few words, for instance, the Greeks would have told the story of Abelard and Heloise, making but a sentence of our classical dictionary.... We moderns, on the other hand, collect only the raw materials of biography and history, “memoirs to serve for a history,” which is but materials to serve for a mythology.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“The competent leader of men cares little for the niceties of other peoples’ characters: he cares much—everything—for the exterior uses to which they may be put.... These are men to be moved. How should he move them? He supplies the power; others simply the materials on which that power operates.”
—Woodrow Wilson (1856–1924)