The kachina is based on the eagle dance, part of a healing ceremony which will heal any disease. Danced by only two men, it is one of the most lively of all pueblo dances. It requires unusual skill and an amazing control of leg muscles in its stooping, swooping, varied movements. The dancers circle round each other, hopping, swooping, performing maneuvers of the greatest intricacy with quick steps and inconceivable grace. The dance is highly conventionalized and at the same time very realistic. Primarily it is a prayer for that spiritual and physical healing strength which comes only through opening the heart to God.
Teri combined a watercolor painting of a hawk in flight with an opaque acrylic ancient Sikyatki pottery design. This design is a prehistoric bird pattern from the Hopi province in Arizona. In the decoration of Sikyatki ware the most widespread motif used is the bird and feather. This is a rather complicated, fluid design in contrast to the geometric and linear designs of some of the other tribes.
In this watercolor painting, Teri strongly defined the hawk's head and suggested the form of its wings. She interwove her design with an ancient Sikyatki pottery design. Each bird has four tail-feathers and rainclouds on the hind end of the body. A Hopi Kachina is also pictured in this painting.. Kachinas were assumed to have spiritual significance, regarding water, a symbol for the spirit, and prayer for rain--a prayer for that spiritual power which comes only through making the heart available to God.
The final painting in the Hawk Series blends a hawk's head and partial rendering of a wing in watercolor with an acrylic pottery design from the modern Hopi period. This period of design dates back to around 1850. The potter is not concerned with the meaning of the design but paints to please herself only.
This sityatki design from the Hopi province in prehistoric Arizona is used here with a predatory hawk rendered in watercolor. The design was a pottery design with the most general motif being the circular bird and feather pattern. Teri enjoys using circular patterns to unify and focus her work..
The mountain lion is a good tree climber, an excellent hunter who attacks by stealth. It lives alone and associates with other lions only during mating season. it preys primarily on deer.
According to Indian legend, the spirits attempted to transform all the animals into humans but only succeeded in changing the eyse of the wolf. (The World of the Wolf, by Candace Savage, p. 28, copyright 1996 by Candace Savage.)
In this painting Teri used an ancient pottery design from Homolobi Ruin near Winslow, Arizona, in black watercolor, and incorporated it with her acrylic painting of a Navajo Sun Dancer Kachina. Indians dressed as Kachinas dance in ceremonial and sacred dances and the carving of small kachina dolls is a beautiful Navajo art form. Kachinas were assumed to have spiritual significance.
The buffalo was life to the Plains Indians until the white man's goods and ways first eliminated, then replaced, the animal. If a child's name included the word "buffalo" in it, the Indians believed that the child would be especially strong and would mature quickly.
The Blackfeet had special mystic rites for calling buffalo herds into their area. The Mandan prayed to the Great Spirit to send them meat. In the Mandan dance the men danced three days, each wearing a huge mask made of an entire buffalo's head.
Without the ever present buffalo it is certain all of the Indians could not have survived on the Great Plains.
--Adapted from drawing and text by Thomas E. Mails in The Mystic Warriors of the Plains, (1972, 1991, The Mallard Press, U.S.A., Mexico)
The buffalo represented everything necessary to everyday life for the Plains Indians. the Indians traveled with the buffalo in winter months. They utilized every part of the buffalo for food, shelter, clothing, and religious items. they endowed the buffalo with deep spiritual significance. The Plains Indians survived due to the buffalo. (See "Buffalo Dancer" also.)
Santa Fe is well known for its beautiful aspen trees. People come from everywhere to view the golden mountainsides when the glittering leaves turn in the fall. Aspens are Teri's favorite trees and one of the many things she loves about her native New Mexico.