:This article is about the American artist. For the Spanish field hockey player, see María Isabel Martínez

Maria Martinez (1887 ? 1980) was a Native American artist who created internationally known pottery. Martinez (born Maria Antonia Montoya), her husband Julian, and other family members examined traditional Pueblo pottery styles and techniques to create pieces which reflect the Pueblo people's legacy of fine artwork and crafts.

Maria was from the San Ildefonso Pueblo, a community located 20 miles northwest of Santa Fe, New Mexico. At an early age, she learned pottery skills from her aunt. During this time, Spanish tinware and Anglo enamelware had become readily available in the Southwest, making the creation of traditional cooking and serving pots less necessary. The art of traditional pottery making was in jeopardy of extinction. Fortunately, Maria continued her interest in the fine art, and experimented with different techniques.

Iris Nampeyo (1860?-1942) was a Hopi potter who lived on the Hopi Reservation in present-day Arizona.Dillingham, Rick. Fourteen Families in Pueblo Pottery. pp. 14-15. University of New Mexico Press, (reprint edition) 1994. Various sources give either 1859 or 1860 as Nampeyo's birthdate. She received the English name Iris as an infant, but was better known by her Tewa name, Num-pa-yu, means "snake that does not bite". She was born at Hano Pueblo, which is primarily made up of descendants of the Tewa tribe who fled west to Hopi lands after the Pueblo Rebellion of 1680. Her mother, Ootca-ka-o was Tewa; her father Qots-vema, from nearby Walpi Pueblo, was Hopi.

Hopi people make ceramics painted with beautiful designs, and Nampeyo was eventually considered one of the finest Hopi potters. Nampeyo learned pottery making through the efforts of her paternal grandmother. In the 1870's, she made a steady income by selling her work at a local trading post operated by Thomas Keam.Wade Edwin L., Lea S. McChesney and Thomas Keam. "Historic Hopi Ceramics: The Thomas V. Keam Collection of the Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology". She became increasingly interested in ancient pottery form and design, recognizing them as superior to Hopi pottery produced at the time. Her second husband, Lesou (or Lesso) was employed by the archaeologist J. Walter Fewkes at the excavation of the prehistoric ruin of Sikyátki in the 1890's. Lesou helped Nampeyo find shards showing the old forms and Fewkes produced detailed illustrations of reconstructed pots.

Nampeyo developed her own style based on the traditional designs. Her work was purchased for the Smithsonian Institution and by collectors worldwide. In 1904 and 1907, she produced and sold pottery at the Grand Canyon lodge owned by the Fred Harvey Company. She and her husband traveled to Chicago in 1898 and 1910 to display her work.

Nampeyo began to lose her sight in 1925, but continued to form and shape pots by touch. These later pots were painted by members of her family, including her four daughters, who also became well-known potters. She worked with clay until her death in 1942.

Nampeyo's photograph was often used as a symbol of the Hopi people and, by the end of her life, she was drawing huge numbers of tourists to her workshop. Her influence led to a renewal of the pottery making tradition among the Hopi and to the elevation of traditional pottery forms and decoration to an art form.