Project Description
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Across North America and the world, Indigenous women have been responsible for maintaining tribal histories, passing down sacred knowledge, and ensuring that cultural practices survive despite centuries of colonial suppression. Oral history has been crucial in maintaining Indigenous identity in the face of forced assimilation, displacement, and cultural erasure. This practice is reinforced through artistic traditions such as Pueblo pottery, where figures like the Storyteller serve as cultural artifacts and visual representations of the importance of oral history.
The first Storyteller figure was initially created in 1964 by Helen Cordero to honor her grandfather. Cordero’s depiction of a seated elder with an open mouth and children surrounding them embodies the act of storytelling. Storytellers quickly became a staple in Pueblo ceramics, symbolizing the intergenerational transmission of knowledge, values, and history. Today, the Storyteller has taken on many forms, like cats, birds, turtles, and even kangaroos. Each sculpted element on the Storyteller figure is intentional, reflecting significant aspects of Pueblo life. For example, in the clothing and adornments in the Berea College Art Collection’s Storyteller, such as the squash blossom necklace, carry deep cultural meaning. The necklace symbolizes fertility, wisdom, wealth, and power that can further define the role of Indigenous women in their communities.
Storytellers are traditionally made with natural clays found in the surrounding environment; the artists process the clay, and the clarification process can take weeks. Once the clay is ready, the artist rolls out the clay into even ropes and then coils them atop one another to create the body of the figure, leaving the figure hollow. The children are sculpted separately from the elder and attached later before drying. After all the elements are in place, the figure is left to air dry to reduce the chance of them cracking in the kiln. Storytellers are traditionally fired in outdoor kilns using wood or dung to achieve the final hardened form. The slips and pigments used to paint them are often derived from natural sources. The craft is passed down and kept alive through family members. If the artists have children, they are present during this creation process, given their own clay, and are allowed to explore their creativity while learning important skills from their elders.
Not much is known about Mary Frances Herrera’s life. Here is what we do know: Herrera was among the first artists to adopt and evolve the Storyteller type, crafting both full-sized and miniature Storyteller figures. We also know that her matriarchal lineage traces back to Laurencita, a well-known ceramicist in Pueblo history. We can conclude that Herrera learned what she knew from her mother. Herrera continued this tradition and passed down her pottery knowledge to her three children. One of her daughters, Dorothy, is known for her animal Storytellers and unique colors. Herrera is a testament to the importance of intergenerational communication and women’s importance in communities. The resilience demonstrated in these artistic traditions parallels the broader role of Indigenous women in safeguarding their communities’ histories through storytelling.
Storytellers symbolize the deep responsibility placed on women as knowledge bearers, ensuring that their people’s stories, wisdom, and histories persist despite external pressures. The Storyteller figures created by Helen Cordero and Mary Herrera are tangible representations of this vital tradition. By passing down stories through generations, Indigenous women preserve their communities’ past and affirm their identities in the present and future. Their role in maintaining oral traditions ensures that Indigenous histories remain alive, resisting the forces of colonization and cultural erasure. As seen in the continuation of Pueblo ceramics, storytelling is not just a method of record-keeping but an act of cultural survival.
Essay written by Vanessa L., Peace and Social Justice major, Berea College Class of 2027