Jo Esther Parshall is from the Lakota community of Cheyenne River, South Dakota. Parshall is a renown practitioner of the traditional Plains women's art of porcupine quillwork. During the late 1980s, she received the right to work with porcupine quills from Carrie Brady, a Mandan-Hidatsa cultural elder. Her goal, she says, was to produce work that was "visually big and spiritually big," connecting important aspects of life and culture. In 1993, she was awarded "Best in Show" at the Northern Plains Tribal Arts Show for a fully-quilled horse mask, a form that had been made rarely, if ever, during the past century. Since then, her major works have been eagerly sought by museums and collectors and have garnered many awards. This quilled horse mask was commissioned by the Museum of the South Dakota State Historical Society in 1994 and was on loan from that institution. Parshall now teaches quillwork to others who will continue this cultural art in the future.