Santa Clara Pueblo Turtle Pottery By Cecilia Tafoya "Joy"

Mid/Late 20th Century

1" H x 1.875" L  x 1.5" W" 

Hand Coiled Turtle with a High Bulbous Shell, Four Legs, a Tail and a Long Neck with Facial Features

From a Private Colorado Collection

In Very Good Condition

The Tafoya name is one of the most prominent in Santa Clara Pueblo pottery, tracing back to matriarch Serafina (Sara Fina) Tafoya (1863–1949) and her daughter Margaret Tafoya (1904–2001), who helped popularize large carved blackware jars. Many descendants continue the tradition. 

Joy Cain (b. 1947) is a documented Santa Clara potter and great-granddaughter of Serafina Tafoya. She is part of the extended Cain/Naranjo/Tafoya family lineage (through Christina Naranjo and Mary Cain). Joy specializes in traditional coil-built, carved, polished, and pit-fired black-on-black or redware pieces, often with symbolic designs like avanyu. She and her siblings (including Linda Cain and the late Billy Cain) come from a multi-generational pottery family. No direct records link her specifically to turtle effigies, though family members have made animal figures.