Local Artists Create Ornaments

Say “Christmas in Santa Fe” and visions of Canyon Road caroling, bizcochitos and piñon fires come to mind.

For those who want to extend the city’s unique take on the holidays onto the tree, local artists have created an array of ornaments in clay, fiber, leather and glass.

Cochiti Pueblo artist Morningstar has created miniature pots from dried gourds and cream and black paint. “He grew these gourds himself,” said Susan Weber, owner of Susan’s Christmas Shop at 115 E. Palace Ave. “He sold them like crazy to everybody at Cochiti.”

The pieces range from $14 to $20, depending on size.

Jemez Pueblo’s Peggy Chinana made clay “balloon baskets” cradling tiny pueblo children. The ornaments sell for $12. Mary Toya, also from Jemez, made miniature koshare clown figures holding melons and soccer balls for $16.

For guests searching for a hostess gift, Santa Fe native Elke Stuart makes delicate candles piped with chiles, gingerbread men, snowmen and delicate sprays of glitter for $7.50 a pair.

Also new to the shop, Leah Benau of Taos stitched felt fairy tale figures like Hansel and Gretel and Little Red Riding Hood, as well as local historical figures, with an artist’s attention to detail. Georgia O’Keeffe wears a tiny concho and carries a sunflower; Mrs. Claus clutches a homemade potholder. Her more famous spouse dangles a list with a miniature pencil; Red Riding Hood’s Big Bad Wolf sports a waistcoat.

The feather-light figures range from $26 to $52, depending on the size and whether they come singularly or in pairs.

“What you’re not seeing is Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera,” Weber said. “We sold out of that. And they don’t break.”

For collectors who prefer a more local focus, the shop carries a painted blue wooden Shed Restaurant doorway ornament for $26.

Across the street at 116 E. Palace Ave. at The Shop, A Christmas Store, owners Rick and Janice Griego boast a miniature burro and Mary and Joseph to add to a menagerie of historic and New Mexico clay figures by Jil Gurule of Alameda. The works range from $24-$26. The artist also makes chile hot air balloons with koshare and mudhead figures for $36.

Richard Gabriel frames his drawings of New Mexico churches in traditional tin frames; Santa Fe’s Santa Maria de la Paz and San Albino in Mesilla are his latest additions for $6.80.

“He does all the tinwork himself,” Griego said. “He’s also got a nativity.”

Santana Seonia of Jemez Pueblo makes tiny clay bowls for $10 and angel madonnas for $30. The artist also creates “special shape” balloons in the form of moccasins, chiles and pueblos trailing baskets of miniature children.

The shop also carries electronic luminarias, chile lights and imported ornaments.

“A lot of our visitors are looking for our locally crafted items,” Griego said. “With our customers here in town, it’s sort of a mix.” As the season unfolds, Weber expects to display a Navajo treetop angel made from velvet. She estimated the price at about $100. “They’re so authentically detailed, with a squash blossom,” she said. “It’s the only treetop angel I’ve seen that looks like it knows how to butcher a sheep.”