Following Spanish reoccupation in 1692, native pottery that symbolized anything considered ‘religious’ (in a Native, non-Catholic way) was banned. As a result, everyday life and social commentary came to shape the design of Cochiti pottery, and by the 1880s the pottery began to feature more contemporary characters. Says Ortiz, “They were based on a lot of the operas that came through. The railroad would bring Mexican circus sideshows, so there were these circus sideshow characters, like tattooed people and Siamese twins, and really cool, freak-looking stuff.” But as the 19th Century came to a close, rigid Victorian attitudes frowned upon such caricatures, so this style of Cochiti pottery fell by the wayside. Ortiz grew up the son of potters — one of only a few families still making pottery using traditional Pueblo methods and materials — however, the caricature style was long gone by that time, and therefore not within his parents’ artistic scope. When Ortiz was a teenager, there was a pottery dealer from Albuquerque who occasionally traveled to the Pueblos to make acquisitions, and he was surprised to recognize themes in Ortiz’s work that were similar to the late-1800s Cochiti designs. He was curious to know where Ortiz was getting those ideas from, since it was not a style he had been exposed to.

Film and Fashion

Although the exhibition reflects on 338-year-old events, other aspects of Ortiz’s work cast this neglected history 162 years forward — into a fantastical future. Seeing the original Star Wars movie when he was 7 years old sparked a lifelong interest in Sci-Fi movies and comic-book heroes for Ortiz. In time, he realized that this would be a palatable way to bring the story of the 1680 Revolt to today’s viewers, inspiring him to write a movie script that reimagines the revolt occurring both in 1680 — and simultaneously 500 years later in the year 2180 — with interplay occurring between the two eras. In the script he bestows the players with supernatural powers and sci-fi costumes. This next-generation rendering also adds new characters. One such example is the female character Tahu — a comrade of Po’pay. Ortiz decided to write in a female main character, because he feels both historically, and currently, “Women are not thanked enough for how much they do.”

Spanish mission iconography and historic Pueblo pottery culled from Colorado College and FAC collections are also incorporated into the exhibition. Ortiz explains, “I really wanted to tell the backstory of when the Spanish first arrived in New Mexico, and how the Conquistadors destroyed the Pueblo pottery. The Pueblo people were accused of witchcraft and sorcery, and they were forced to stop making the pottery.” Had it not been for the revolt, would the Pueblo culture have been erased? Says Ortiz, “Probably, because all the Pueblos had to go underground to keep existing. [The Spaniards] called it ‘religion,’ but it wasn’t really religion literally — it was just a way of life.”