Storytellers Pottery

The first Pueblo storyteller is attributed to Helen Cordero of Cochiti Pueblo who created her first storyteller in the image of her Grandfather, an important man in the Pueblo and a wonderful storyteller. Without a written language, Native American tribes depended upon their storytellers to remember and pass on tribal folklore, history, and traditions. The Cordero family still continues Helen’s traditional Pueblo storyteller tradition and many artists from Jemez, Cochiti, Acoma, and other Pueblos have become well known for their own interpretation of the storyteller. Though Helen Cordero’s first storytellers were male figures, the traditional storyteller is generally a female figure, depicted with open mouth, closed eyes and surrounded by children. Today storytellers take many different forms, shapes, and sizes including animals like Coyote.