Native American Arts and Crafts—California
Native American Arts and Crafts in California encompasses the diverse artistic traditions of various tribal groups, primarily centered around basketry, which is regarded as a significant craft in the region. California tribes, such as the Pomo and Chumash, engaged in hunting, gathering, and fishing, and their artistic expressions reflect their cultural practices and environments. While they did not develop monumental art like some other Native American tribes, they excelled in basket-making, employing both coiling and twining techniques depending on their geographical location.
The baskets served multiple purposes, ranging from functional containers for cooking and storage to ceremonial objects used in rituals marking significant life events. Aesthetically, these baskets featured intricate geometric patterns and often included materials like feathers and shells, particularly in the exquisite "jewel" baskets of the Pomo, which held deep emotional and cultural significance. Additionally, rock art, notably practiced by the Chumash, involved painting personal dream imagery on rock surfaces, conveying a rich spiritual narrative through vibrant colors derived from natural minerals. Overall, the arts and crafts of California's Native American tribes illustrate a profound connection to their identity, environment, and cultural heritage.
Native American Arts and Crafts—California
Tribes affected: Chumash, Cupeño, Fernandeño, Gabrielino, Hupa, Kato, Luiseño, Maidu, Miwok, Modoc, Patwin, Pomo, Salinan, Tolowa, Wintun, Yana, Yokuts, Yurok
Significance: Californian tribes are known for fine basketry work and rock art
California tribes hunted, gathered, and fished, and they were divided into many relatively small groups. Although they neither produced monumental art nor possessed a complex art tradition as did the tribes of the Southwest or the Plains, they were nevertheless masters in basketry. Artistic traditions were divided into three geographical zones within the state of California. The southernmost groups had poorly made pottery, carved stone bowls and figures (including stone effigies), rock art, and basketry. The central groups, especially the Pomo, were master basketmakers. The northern groups were influenced by Native American Northwest Coast arts and crafts and made plank houses, dugout canoes, slat armor, and basketry hats.
Basketry
The preeminent craft of Native Americans in California has been basketry. They used both coiling and twining techniques, with coiling being done by the southern groups and twining by the northern ones. Basketry was used to make most containers and to provide many other functional necessities, including mats, baby boards, and boats. Basketry was also used to make decorative objects such as headdresses, and was a part of religious rituals and the life passage rituals of birth, puberty, marriage, and death.
Basketry has always been a woman’s art among the California groups, and it provided the women with their primary means of aesthetic expression. Basket designs, considered to be the property of women, were usually geometric and abstract, including circles, crosses, steps, and parallel line designs. Stylized figures of plants and people were also made. Natural vegetable colors were used to achieve the designs. The aesthetic accomplishment in the finer baskets from this region goes far beyond the functional needs for which the basketry was made.
The finest examples of basketry are the “jewel” or “gift” baskets made by Pomo women. These special baskets incorporated feather mosaics into the design along with clam and abalone shells. Red, white, black, blue, and green feathers were used. In some cases the feathers and shells were used sparingly to heighten the basketry design, but in others they became a second layer which totally covered the basket and formed designs of their own. Shells hung along the rim or sides of the basket as ornamentation.
These “jewel” baskets were not only made by women, but were also made as gifts for other women. They were seen as a special ceremonial gift for a woman at important life passage points in her life, such as birth, puberty, and marriage. These baskets had emotional importance for Indian women, probably forming part of self-identity. They were usually cremated along with the woman at death.
Baskets also play a crucial role in mythology. One story says that the earth did not originally have the light of the sun. The original culture hero and creator discovered a village where there was light which was kept in baskets in a sacred sweatlodge. Able to steal one of the magic sun baskets, he hung it in the sky so that all would have light.
Functional baskets were important to the economy of the California groups. Since most groups did not have pottery, baskets were used for cooking and domestic purposes which included storing, grinding, toasting, and boiling food. Water containers were also made from baskets. Although some groups sealed their baskets with pitch or tar, the Pomo, Patwin, and other groups from central California made coiled baskets so tightly bound that they were naturally waterproof.
Rock Art
Rock art consisted of painting highly personalized dream images onto rocky cliffs or overhangs. The Chumash seem to have been the only group to practice it. This art may have reproduced hallucinogenic images seen by men after the ceremonial taking of datura. Rock art consists of compositions of geometric forms, including circles, zigzags, diamonds, chevrons, and crosses, juxtaposed with figures of animals, plants, and people. The colors normally used were strong, saturated hues of red, yellow/orange, black, white, and blue, and the paints were made from minerals and bonded with vegetable and animal oils. The practice of this art seems to have died out in the late 1800’s without the meanings being explained in historical records.