Newby-Coker’s art featured in Echo, Stanford University and Colorado Museum

Award-winning Choctaw artist Lauretta Newby-Coker is well known for her beautiful stained-glass mosaic art. She is also one of many Choctaws who contributed to the recently released Disney+ Marvel series, Echo.

Newby-Coker was contacted by Disney+ and told they were interested in purchasing one of her pieces to use in a film, which she later found out was Echo. She was told Disney+ had researched her art, and she was asked to send photos of all available artwork she had for sale, and the purchase was made.

Newby-Coker is still excited when she talks about it.

“I was thrilled to death. It was quite the honor,” she said.

The artist was also recently chosen, along with over 25 other artists, to participate in the upcoming Women’s Work exhibit at the A.R. Mitchell Museum of Western Art in Trinidad, Colorado. Participating artists were chosen from 120 artists who sent in images of over 1,000 examples of artwork. The exhibit is sponsored by Cowgirl Artists of America.

According to the museum website, Women’s Work will connect juried artists with women on working ranches and Native artists with their tribes. Juried artists will create work for the show inspired by the people and places they are connected. Native artists have the option to partner with their tribe, allowing them to create works that genuinely reflect their own stories, traditions, and culture. The show will be open from August 2 – September 30, 2024.

Newby-Coker will submit two mosaics for the show, a 4’x4′ stained-glass mosaic of the endangered Choctaw Ponies and a 4’x4′ piece representing the rare Oklahoma white buffalo from northeastern Oklahoma. She plans to visit locations with the ponies and the buffalo for inspiration.

Stanford University has also commissioned her for a stained-glass mosaic landscape of Yosemite National Park. The piece will be installed in 2025.

Her love for art began as a child. She completed a Fine Arts bachelor’s degree and became a teacher, retiring after 26 years in 2021.

Newby-Coker has worked with many art mediums and is proficient in oil and acrylics, coffee and ink wash, pencil drawing, stained-glass mosaics, sculpture, watercolors, printmaking, book illustration, murals, scrimshaw and forensic arts. She likes to choose portraits, landscapes, wildlife, floral compositions and figures from the Native American experience. Newby-Coker teaches art to Chickasaw students during the summer.

Her art has been on display across the United States and Finland. She has had pieces displayed at the Oklahoma State Capital, the Oklahoma Hall of Fame and the U.S. Capital at The White House.

You can see more of Newby-Coker’s art by visiting her website.