Let’s Yak About Art: Mata Ortiz

My previous post segues nicely into this session of Let’s Yak About Art. . The last time Lew and I had dinner with his Wednesday Boys’ Night Out buddies, and their wives, the woman sitting closest to me, Marcia, shared with me about Mata Ortiz. She encouraged me to read about this incredible artist community located in the Mexcian state of Chihuahua, at the base of the mountain El Indio.

The story of Mata Ortz begins with Juan Quezada. When Quezada was a young boy he helped support his family by gathering firewood. During his treks he’d often find shards of pottery from the work of the Casas Grandes people, also referred to as Paquime. These shards dated as far back as 1130 AD. From what I’ve read, he also discovered a cave with a few complete pots in it.

His curiosity peaked, Quezada looked around at what was available to him—- red, orange and white clays from local soil, painting pigments created from minerals he found near his village, slow burning cows’ dung for firing pots, brushes created using hair. He ganged up this local material with trial and error to develop his pottery style, where the pots are hand built without use of a pottery wheel. After perfecting his art, Quezada taught his brothers and sisters to make pottery which  blossomed into the artist community of hundreds of potters that exists today.

The story of Mata Ortiz doesn’t end here. As Quezada, and his growing peers of potters, sold pottery to people passing through their area, it slowly made inroads into the United States. Some of their work ended up in a second hand store located in New Mexico where anthropologist Spencer MacCallum was dallying about one afternoon. The intensity of their style and beauty captured his attention and he traced their origins back to the community of Mata Ortiz. He went on to study the art of Mata Ortiz and help find a niche market for it internationally.

Take a look here at the examples of the pots being created by the potters of Mata Ortiz. While they strive to keep the integrity of the ancient art of the people of Casas Grandes, each artist explores the medium in new and refreshing ways as they stylize their pots with color. The first thing that struck me was how the vessel shapes, along with the vivid reds and blacks, strongly reminded me of the pottery of Ancient Greece. And yet, each piece is unique and made completely from local materials thousands of miles from Greece. I also felt holistic ties to the work from my exposure to Pacific Northwest Indian Art and Alaskan Inuit art.

There is something to be said about “traditional” crafts, using and enjoying what you have, letting go of what you don’t have and the satisfaction that can come from trying, failing, trying again and learning.