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Born the twelfth of fifteen children, Evelyn Rock Cly spent a great deal of her early years with her paternal grandmother, Wanda Rock. A basket weaver, Grandmother Rock taught Evelyn the art when she was only about five years old, over 30 years ago. "First a pitchpot", Evelyn remembers, "then a plain basket. Then I started making designs in the baskets."
"I think geometric designs is what I want to do," Evelyn continues, explaining the difference between herself and some of her relatives who have gone against traditional taboos in making pictorial baskets. Evelyn does not portray the Yei and other sacred symbols, out of respect for her elders and their teachings. "Some 'step to the side' and do it anyway," Evelyn says, but she also indicates that they have suffered consequences because of it.
Evelyn has been very successful with her "non-offending" geometric designs. She never really plans out her baskets with sketches or graph paper. She says she has new ideas "all of the time, out of my head; it just comes to the back of my mind. When I think about it (as she is weaving) the colors come... it turns out really neat."
Evelyn believes in the concept of less being more. At one time she worked in a trading post and she noticed that the woven baskets that had the most appeal were usually simple in design. "They have more feeling," she observes, "and look better from a distance." Then she adds that she doesn't care for "too busy" of a design.
Born in Monument Valley, Evelyn still lives within the world famous red rock formations. She was raised in the Navajo tradition, hearing Navajo legends and myths by firelight, "in wintertime." She has done some rug weaving but prefers making baskets.
Perhaps one of the reasons Evelyn makes such a quality basket is because she "takes breaks"-she only weaves 3 or 4 days out of the week. When she's not working on a basket she doesn't worry over it. She says that as soon as she picks up the baskets to work on them, then the ideas begin flowing into her head.
"I really concentrate," she says, explaining her tight strong weave and symmetry. "I'm careful to keep it even", referring to the rods.
Evelyn is the mother of 3 children ages 9 to 19. Her two sons and daughter have all made and sold baskets, but as yet don't have their mother's interest in making them. Or, perhaps, it is her inspiration they lack. There are very few weavers who are able to sit down and design as they go.
2. A word might be said regarding the symbolism attached to the design of Navajo wedding trays, for it is one of the few southwestern basketry decorations which probably has meaning. One very simple interpretation is that the inner black steps represent the underworld; the red band is the earth and life; and the outer black steps stand for the upper world. Fishler recites the following interpretation which he obtained from one of his Navajo informants. The center spot (often a tiny opening) in the basket "represents the beginning of this earth as the Navajo merged from the cane"; the white around this is the earth. Stepped black designs represent the mountains, boundaries of Navajo lands; water bags and rainbows are draped on the mountains, clouds also rise from thm. All the white in the basket represents dawn, all red the sun's rays, and all black the clouds, said the informant. Fishler adds much symbolism relative to numbers of coils; he then tells how Navajo legend relates that this wedding basket design was given to this tribe by White Shell Woman, and Thunder taught them to weave the water jar and carrying basket. The braided rim is explained by the Navajo in terms of this legend: A Navajo woman was weaving under a juniper tree, trying to think of finishing the rim in some manner different from that of the regular stitch. A god tore a small sprig from the tree and tossed it into her basket. Immediately she thought of the braided rim. (Indian Baskets of the Southwest Clara Lee Tanner (1983)).
3. The basket is viewed as a map, through which the Navajo people chart their lives. The central spot in the basket represents the sipapu, where the Navajo people emerged from the prior world through a reed. As the people emerged, all was white. The inner coils of the basket are white to represent this lightness, or birth. As you travel outward on the coils you begin to encounter more and more black. The black represents darkness, struggle and pain; the darker side of life. As you make your way through the darkness you eventually reach the red bands, which represent marriage; the mixing of your blood with your spouse and the creation of family. The red is pure. During this time there is no darkness. Traveling out of the familial bands you encounter more darkness, however, the darkness is interspersed with white light. The light represents increasing enlightenment, which expands until you enter the all white banding of the outer rim. This banding represents the spirit world, where there is no darkness. The line from the center of the basket to the outer rim is there to remind you that no matter how much darkness you encounter in your world, there is always a pathway to the light. (As told to Steven P. Simpson by an informant, 1993).
