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Pueblo Indian Watercolors: Watercolors and Artists

Awa Tsireh, Animal Designs

Before European explorers and settlers brought paper into the Southwest, Pueblo Indian artists painted their most elaborate images on pottery. Some of the first Pueblo painters to use paper adapted designs used on pottery to the flat surface of paper. The many designs in this painting resemble designs that were used to decorate pottery. The artist, Awa Tsireh, also created fantastic beasts and creatures using a variety of traditional patterns and shapes.

Questions for Students

What animals do these designs remind you of? Although these designs don't look like animals at all, we can still recognize them. What parts of the designs help to indicate specific creatures? For instance, what shapes do you need to suggest a face? Will two dots and a curving mouth be enough? How simple can something be and still be recognizable?

Pictured above: Awa Tsireh, Animal Designs (details), about 1917–20, watercolor on paper, 60 x 66.35 cm. Corbin-Henderson Collection, Gift of Alice H. Rossin