Doña Rosa

Rosa Real Mateo de Nieto was a ceramics artisan from Oaxaca, Mexico. Doña Rosa is renowned for her method of making barro negro. The black, shiny appearance is fully realized after firing the clay.  Explore here to learn more about Doña Rosa, and the store, workshop & studio in San Bartolo, Coyotepec.

Doña Rosa’s ceramics

Doña Rosa’s black pottery became a favorite of collectors and is now mimicked by others throughout Oaxaca and elsewhere. Barro negro pottery has been produced for hundreds of years. 

Examples of it have been found at numerous archeological sites in Mexico. This style of black clay pottery has remained a traditional craft of the indigenous Zapotec and Mixtec peoples to this day.

Doña Rosa became a famous master of this form of Mexican folk art.  She practiced her craft for decades, producing the often shiny, black clay pottery without glaze and without paint using techniques she developed and sold the works from her family home and studio.

Early examples of barro negro had a matte finish.  Doña Rosa discovered in the 1950s that she could change the color and shine of her ceramics using a technique still employed. She would polish it with a quartz stone before firing, when the clay is nearly completely dry. This compresses the surface of the clay before it is drying is complete. Then by firing at slightly lower temperature than normal, the result is a much more shinny surface. This tends to produce a more brittle pottery, so it is more ornamental than functional. She produced a wide variety of vessels and figures.

The photo on the left shows Doña Rosa polishing a pot after the clay has dried.  The vessel will then be ready for firing and the black color will emerge.  The pictures on this page were taken in the mid-1960’s.