Angie Reano Owen

Angelita "Angie" Reano Owen (born 1946) is a Kewa Pueblo jeweler and lapidary artist.

Santa Domingo Pueblo, birthplace of Angie Reano Owen

Owen is known for her intricate and modern pieces that are inspired by prehistoric Anasazi and Hohokam inlay jewelry designs. She is recognized for helping to popularize this traditional craft after it had become largely unknown in the 1970s.

Biography

Owen was born in 1946 to Joe Isidro and Clara Lovato Reano^[1] in Santo Domingo Pueblo in New Mexico.^[2] Her family was known for their heshi shell beads, and her mother was a Pueblo jewelry artist.^[3] As one of Joe and Clara's eight children, she joined in the family's jewelry business making thunderbird necklaces for the tourist trade, after the boom in interest in Southwestern jewelry.^[4][5] Owen and her brothers and sisters would sell the family's wares on the steps of the Palace of the Governors in Santa Fe, New Mexico.^[6][7]

Hohokam turquoise mosaics, an example of the Pre-Columbian art that inspires Owen's jewelry designs

In the 1970s, Owen became known for her mastery of ancient Anasazi and Hohokam inlay jewelry, a delicate technique which she is noted for reviving.^[8]

After a trip to Tucson, Arizona, where she viewed pre-historic mosaic inlays, Owen began to develop her own take on the traditional artwork. She innovated a technique of combining shell and stone with a unique adhesive that is known only to the family.^[9]

Her mosaics use slices of stones and shell, such as turquoise, coral and Tiger cowrie, which are arranged in patterns or landscapes and inlaid with epoxy.^[3][10] They are carefully placed, set, then sanded smooth.^[11]

By the 1980s, her designs became more elaborate, with mosaic designs adorning complex organic forms,^[12] arranged in an "unconventional integration of various prehistoric and postmodern design elements".^[13] Owen's designs are noted for their intricacy and multifaceted surfaces of inlaid shells, stones and natural materials.^[14][15]

Owen is recognized for helping popularize this traditional Anasazi style of native American jewelry, which was not well known and had few artisans practicing the craft.^[16][17][18] After developing her technique, she taught her family members to carry on the tradition, including her brother Joe, sister in law Angie P. Reano, and her children Rena, Dean and Donna.^[3][19] Other members of the Reano Owen family have gone on to become talented inlay jewelry artisans in their own right.^[5]

In 1995, she was named the Ronald and Susan Dubin Artist Fellow at the School for Advanced Research, located in Santa Fe.^[8]

Owen has won several Best of Division awards at the Santa Fe Indian Market and Heard Museum (Phoenix, Arizona) markets for her work.^[20][21]

Collections

• "Bracelet" – School for Advanced Research, Indian Arts Research Center^[22]
• "Mosaic cuff bracelet",^[12] "Chiclet necklace",^[23] "Cuff bracelet",^[3] "Old-style tab necklace",^[24] "Bracelet"^[25] – Museum of Fine Arts Boston^[26]
• "Earrings" – National Museum of the American Indian^[27]
• IAIA Museum of Contemporary Native Arts (MoCNA)
• "Bracelet" – Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art^[28]

Exhibitions

• Get a Bead On: Jewelry and Small Objects – Racine Art Museum^[29]
• RAM Showcase: Focus on Adornment – Racine Art Museum^[30]
• Totems to Turquoise – American Museum of Natural History^[31]
• Turquoise, Water Sky: The Stone and Its Meaning – Museum of Indian Arts and Culture^[2][32]
• Water, Wind, Breath: Southwest Native Art – Barnes Foundation^[33]

See also

• Glycymeris, a shell of a saltwater clam that Owen uses in her jewelry designs following the Hohokam tradition
• Olivella white shells used in her designs
• Spiny oyster, mollusk shell used in her designs

References

1. "Angie Owen & Family". the shop of . the rainbow man . in old santa fe. Retrieved January 21, 2025.
2. Graff, Michelle (May 10, 2016). "Museum to Host Turquoise Jewelry Exhibition". National Jeweler. Retrieved January 21, 2025.
3. "Cuff bracelet". collections.mfa.org. Retrieved January 21, 2025.
4. "Angie Reano Owen attributes this Depression-era necklace to her mother, Clara Reano. Made of turquoise chips, red and white plastic, and gypsum beads, it was found in its original box from Verkamp's Trading Post at the Grand Canyon. Collection Karen Sires. – El Palacio". Retrieved January 21, 2025.
5. Pardue, Diana F. (2007). Contemporary Southwestern Jewelry. Gibbs Smith. ISBN 978-1-4236-0190-6.
6. "Silversmith & Lapidary Biographies: Angie Reano Owen". www.bischoffsgallery.com. Retrieved January 21, 2025.
7. "Santo Domingo Pueblo's Depression Jewelry – El Palacio". Retrieved January 21, 2025.
8. "Angie Reano Owen – Artists – Indian Arts Research Center". emuseum.sarsf.org. Retrieved January 21, 2025.
9. "Joe Reano". British Museum.
10. Greenbaum, Toni and Pat Kirkham. "Chapter 8. Women Jewelry Designers." Women Designers in the USA, 1900–2000: Diversity and Difference, edited by Pat Kirkham, Bard Graduate Center and Yale University Press, 2002. A&AePortal, aaeportal.com/?id=-20279.
11. Pardur, Diana (July 16, 2010). "Portfolio | Native American Innovators". Southwest Art Magazine. Retrieved January 21, 2025.
12. "Mosaic cuff bracelet". collections.mfa.org. Retrieved January 21, 2025.
13. Baxter, Paula. "Cross-cultural controversies in the design history of Southwestern American Indian jewellery." Journal of Design History 7.4 (1994): 233-245.
14. Gänsicke, Susanne; Markowitz, Yvonne J. (June 25, 2019). Looking at Jewelry: A Guide to Terms, Styles, and Techniques. Getty Publications. ISBN 978-1-60606-599-0.
15. Lowry, Joe Dan (October 1, 2010). Turquoise. Gibbs Smith. ISBN 978-1-4236-1980-2.
16. "1995 Native Artist Fellows | School for Advanced Research". Retrieved January 21, 2025.
17. Pardue, D. F. (1997). The Cutting Edge: Contemporary Southwestern Jewelry and Metalwork. Heard Museum.
18. Baxter, Paula A.; Bird-Romero, Allison (2000). Encyclopedia of Native American jewelry : a guide to history, people, and terms. Internet Archive. Phoenix : Oryx Press. ISBN 978-1-57356-128-0.
19. "Joe Reano Related Objects". British Museum.
20. Roberts, Kathaleen (August 14, 2021). "Kewa artist Angie Owen uses techniques of her ancestors to craft award-winning jewelry". Albuquerque Journal. Retrieved January 21, 2025.
21. "Angie Owen – Santa Fe Indian Market". Retrieved January 21, 2025.
22. "Bracelet". emuseum.sarsf.org. Retrieved January 21, 2025.
23. ""Chiclet" necklace". collections.mfa.org. Retrieved January 21, 2025.
24. "Old-style tab necklace". collections.mfa.org. Retrieved January 21, 2025.
25. "Bracelet". collections.mfa.org. Retrieved January 21, 2025.
26. "Results – Advanced Search Objects – Museum of Fine Arts, Boston". collections.mfa.org. Retrieved January 21, 2025.
27. "Earrings | National Museum of the American Indian". americanindian.si.edu. Retrieved January 21, 2025.
28. "Bracelet". Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art. Retrieved January 21, 2025.
29. "Get a Bead On: Jewelry and Small Objects". Racine Art Museum. Retrieved January 21, 2025.
30. "RAM Showcase: Focus on Adornment". Racine Art Museum. Retrieved January 21, 2025.
31. Totems to Turquoise Native North American Jewelry Arts of the Northwest and Southwesthttps://www.amnh.org/content/download/58463/944383/file/totems_main.pdf www.amnh.org/resources/exhibitions/totems
32. "Department of Cultural Affairs Media Center :: Media Bank :: Turquoise, Water, Sky: The Stone and Its Meaning :: Contemporary Artistic Expressions". media.newmexicoculture.org. Retrieved January 21, 2025.
33. "Water, Wind, Breath: Southwest Native Art in Community The Barnes Foundation". Barnes Foundation. February 20 – May 15, 2022. Retrieved January 21, 2025.