Amos, Louise

Louise (Abeita Willie) Amos was born into Acoma Pueblo in November 1946. Her parents were Lorenzo and Frances Abeita, her grandmother Dolores (Garcia Abeita) Stein. Her sister, Jennie Laate, learned how to make pottery by watching and working with their grandmother and their mother as she was growing up. But Louise was 13 years younger. She learned how from her mother and sister.

Jennie married Noel Laate and moved to his home at Zuni Pueblo. There she got to work with Daisy Hooee, a Hopi potter from the Nampeyo family who’d also married into Zuni and moved there.

As a teenager, Louise spent significant time in her sister’s home at Zuni. She learned a lot about how to paint Zuni designs. Then she returned to Acoma and married (some of her pieces are signed: Louise Willie).

Louise signed some of her pieces “Zuni Pueblo New Mexico Louise Amos” and other of her pieces “Acoma Pueblo New Mexico Louise Amos.” She used a mix of Zuni and Acoma designs but she used Acoma clays. Louise also painted a significant amount of greenware.