Elia Mateo is a Zapotec potter from San Marcos Tlapazola, Oaxaca, known as the "red clay village," where she carries on a tradition passed down through more than seven generations of women in her family. She works the way her grandmothers did, shaping clay by hand with corncobs, gourd shells, and smooth river stones instead of a wheel, a process that feels less like a technique and more like a conversation with the earth. Elia is part of the Mujeres del Barro Rojo cooperative, a group of women making beautiful, useful pottery while building something bigger: economic independence and a stronger voice for Indigenous women in their community.