This material, which in solution is a brilliant yellow, is used for two purposes—as a slip to color the bases of bowls and ollas, and as a paint to supply the red elements of polychrome designs. After being fired it assumes an orange-red or burnt-sienna color.[15]
Black Ware Paint
This is a paint used for making matte designs on polished black ware, a new departure in decorative technique first used by Maria and Julian Martinez of San Ildefonso, in June, 1921. The substance is a hard yellow stone, said to occur in the “Valle”, west of the Jemez range, near Ojo Caliente, in the same district as the orange-red paint.
The first step in preparing the paint for use is to scrape the stone with a knife. The resulting powder is mixed with water, and there is then added about one-fourth as much dissolved “guaco” (see below) as there is paint. It is said that the purpose of the guaco is to make the paint “stick” to the polished surface. This paint, when ready for use, is kept in a small earthenware or china dish. The consistency of the mixture, like the other paints, is that of water.
Black or Guaco Paint
This is the only vegetable paint used by the San Ildefonso Indians for the decoration of their pottery. It is obtained from a very common weed, known as the Rocky Mountain Bee Plant, or Guaco,[16] which grows in the moister flats of this district in great profusion. It flowers late in July and early August, and the seedpods open toward the first of September. The Indians say it grows at a given place only in alternate years. In favorable spots the plants attain a height of five or six feet ([pl. 10], b).
The plant is gathered during April and May, when the shoots are only six to ten inches high, and therefore tender. Great quantities of it are carried home in shawls and bags. It is placed with water in Apache-clay cooking-pots, and is boiled over an open fire, never on a stove. As guaco has a bitter taste (“hot like pepper”, the women describe it) when not cooked sufficiently, it is necessary to boil it until this unpleasant flavor has disappeared. Over a hot fire half a day is long enough, but often a whole day is required. Then the liquid is drained into wide-mouthed earthen vessels and placed in the sun to harden into a solid, black, rather sticky, mass. Some women reboil the liquid until it thickens, before placing it in the sun. Metal containers are not used, because they are said to spoil the color. The informants stated that hardened guaco was not eaten. When it has become completely solidified it is set away for future use in painting. It will keep indefinitely.
The residue in the pot, after the liquid has been poured off consists of tender stems and leaves. This is eaten by the Indians, and is not unlike spinach.
The hardened guaco juice is stored at least a year before it is used in painting; the longer it is kept the better black it produces. If it is used during the first year, the resulting color on the vessel is a streaky blue-black.
Guaco is prepared for use in painting in the same manner as the other pigments. A chunk of the hardened mass is broken off and dissolved in water. One informant makes a solution which, although black, has the consistency of water. The others use a syrupy solution almost like thin molasses. The paint has a distinctive, not unpleasant, vegetable odor, and is rather sticky. Any small, wide-mouthed Indian bowl, not too shallow, is used as a paint-cup. In this bowl there is always a stirring-stick, usually a splinter from a board.