Harrison Preston
TUCSON 2025 - 2026
Wa:k O’odham artist Harrison Preston is a potter and basket weaver who creates both traditional and contemporary work, all the while trying to preserve and respect the traditions therein. He was raised and currently lives on the San Xavier Indian Reservation (Wa:k), a district of the Tohono O’odham Nation, south of Tucson, Arizona. While attending high school, Preston began learning traditional Tohono O’odham basketry from the noted Tohono O’odham artist and activist, Terrol Dew Johnson. Under Johnson’s tutelage, Preston would go on to win several awards at Native American art markets at the Heard Museum and the Arizona State Museum. After high school, Preston attended the prestigious Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe, NM. Preston also attended Pima Community College in Tucson, where he studied metalsmithing and sculpture. In 2017, Harrison began learning Traditional Tohono O’odham pottery from Kathleen Vance of Sells, AZ, and has collaborated with her and others to reinvigorate O’odham pottery traditions. Harrison can be found demonstrating and displaying his work at regional markets and events across southern Arizona.
COMMUNITY PROJECT
Harrison Preston is working with the O’odham Haha’adam Collective (OHC), a group of O’odham potters whose goal is to advocate and educate on Tohono O’odham pottery making traditions. At one point, pottery makers could be found in every community throughout the traditional O’odham homelands but are now faced with the potential loss of this vitally important cultural craft to modernity. For the O’odham, pottery traditions were not only found in the oral traditions but made survival possible in the arid and harsh Sonoran Desert of Central and Southern Arizona. This project will consist of several gatherings for potters to network, collaborate, exchange information, and build support for novice potters. This will be done as a lead up to the annual ‘Potters Gathering’ held at the Tohono O’odham Nation Cultural Center and Museum in Topawa, Arizona. It is the hope that by establishing a network of pottery makers through gatherings such as this project, younger generations of O’odham will find inspiration to carry this craft into the future.
COMMUNITY PARTNER
O’odham Haha’adam Collective (OHC) is a group of individual artists who have come together to promote the production of O’odham utilitarian pottery. Our purpose is to revitalize and encourage the creation and usage of pottery within all aspects of our Himdag, our way of life. This is accomplished by sharing knowledge within our communities and with anyone who has an interest in this traditional craft and through this exposure we hope to expand our group to include additional O’odham potters. Members of OHC can be found giving classes, workshops, and demonstrations on O’odham pottery at national and historic parks as well as festivals throughout Central and Southern Arizona. We also work with museum groups and organizations when invited. Along this line we have also been instrumental in the planning of an annual potter’s gathering held each spring at the Tohono O’odham Cultural Center and Museum in Topawa, Arizona.