Onward Project

Native Artist Spotlight: Lithuania Denetso
Over the past year, Lithuania Denetso, Collaborator with The ONWARD Project, undertook the study of ceramic making in the tradition of Southwest historic pottery. She was inspired to learn these methods in order to originate shapes and designs using the natural clays and pigments available in the canyons of the Four Corners region of the Southwest where her family history lies. In talking with elderly relatives she discovered that her great grandmother Mary Austin (John Austin’s wife, and parents of Gertie Austin, Max Littlesalt’s wife) was a potter in the late 19th and early 20th century. The ONWARD Project is excited to follow Lithuania’s path as she hones her skills.

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The ONWARD Project

One of the first steps in creating the biography was gathering together of all of the information we had about Gertie from her family. Lithuania Denetso has been our fantastic source for family history and has shared with us hours of audio, video and photographs to help us get a clearer picture of who Gertie was. Part of the challenges with this are that many of Gertie's children are late in life and do not have many clear memories of her. It is also Navajo tradition not to speak of those who have passed away, and many people still abide by this tradition.

Photographed above was the next step after gathering all the information we could. Madi set out to create a rough storyboard with important information and sketches of what each page would look like. This is also where she brainstormed ideas on how to make this biography visually interesting and special. As you can probably guess, the final outcome will look only partially like the original storyboard.

Madi really wanted this graphic biography to feel like an old scrapbook and did a couple of things to get this affect. She chose watercolors that reminded her of desert sunsets and sunrises and painted these colors onto watercolor paper. She then drew little scalloped frames and cut them out by hand; once scanned they could be used throughout the book in different ways.

Madi also tested out many n**e and beige watercolors to find the perfect aged parchment color. After painting a full piece of paper this color, she scanned it and then used it as the background for each page. This gives a consistent feel and adds to the texture of each page.