Cota, Elicena

Elicena Cota Lopez primarily etches and paints brilliantly colored contemporary bird, dragonfly, branch, vine and flower designs on black graphite pots using a complicated process that took several Mata Ortiz potters more than ten years to perfect. But Elicena has the process down and went home from the 2013 Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum Women Potters of Mata Ortiz competition with a Third Place ribbon for Best of Show (traditional black category) and the Second Place ribbon in the Traditional Black category. She has earned several other ribbons since at the annual Concurso Ceramica de Mata Ortiz.

Born in 1979 in Mata Ortiz, Elicena grew up learning how to make pottery with her parents and finally struck out on her own at 17 years old. A few years later she married Efrain Lucero Jr. and they sometimes collaborate on their pottery.

Elicena’s designs usually incorporate birds or dragonflies and a tree branch or vine motif that covers the entire surface of the vessel. The base designs (tree branches, vines, flowers and bird outlines) are scratched into the vessel, then the birds and flowers are painted in.