The Artists of Native Market
Crafting a Market
The Hispano arts and crafts were like nothing commonly seen in the markets of the east. Art patrons who moved to New Mexico saw the potential and thought the struggling makers could benefit from larger sales of their work. Under many different owners and managers, a shop simply dubbed “Native Market” made bold attempts to introduce the world to the arts of New Mexico. The shop not only intended to sell the work of local artists and vocational schools, but also featured the makers in the shop demonstrating their crafts for the customers to see. In an effort to reach a wider market, they went about creating catalogs, contacting retail shops and decorators from coast to coast, and making connections by sending pieces out for exhibit. The women who ran the establishment pulled out all the stops. Their devotion to the artists and craftspeople they represented was true, but the general public’s confusion around what they were seeing held firm. In a letter from a designer in California: “There are two main reasons why I feel this furniture cannot be sold. First: As delivered it is far from a finished product …Secondly: The cost is too high as delivered. The crafting charge is out of reason from my actual knowledge of crafting done there.”
One of Native Market’s final owner/managers, Leonora Paloheimo, was determined to give back to the community she loved and wrote an adamant reply to a suggestion she close the business. “So the advisory board of the Native Market Guild advises dissolution! Too bad! No Momentum! No I do not think it is such a ‘hot’ idea but I cannot suggest a better one.” In response, a letter addressed to her read, “to me, the Market is the deadest of horses …”
