Trujillo, Reycita

Reycita Trujillo was one of the seven women who powered the 1930s Ohkay Owingeh Pottery Revival. They had started out as a sewing club but pivoted to pottery after some ancient pottery was found while someone was digging for a house foundation on pueblo property on the west side of the Rio Grande. They were accidentally digging on the site of a pueblo that was abandoned about the same time the Spanish first arrived in the area and founded San Juan de los Caballeros. Archaeologists determined that the pottery found was pre-contact and free of any foreign influence. The seven women decided to base the new definition of San Juan pottery on those found samples and that new style became known as Potsuwi’i.

Reycita also made other historic styles of Ohkay Owingeh pottery. She made the earliest dated piece of carved blackware Ohkay Owingeh pottery in 1932. She collaborated often with her husband, Juan Hilario Trujillo: he did most of the carving. Working together, they also made the largest pottery of the Ohkay Owingeh Revival.