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Additional Information
Over the years I have created, taught at and
directed several art venues and ceramics studios. In 1976,
I helped create the ceramics studio at Los Andes University, under the direction
of the Dean of
the Art Department: Maria Teresa Guerrero. We began with and a group of 10
students and after
two years we had 90 students at all levels . Many years later, in 1998, after I
received my
Masters degree, I went back and resumed teaching various levels of hand building
and ceramics
sculpture with an historic perspective. Under a new Dean, Lina Espinoza, we were
able to modernize
all the equipment and redesign the facilities.
In the interim, in 1978, I organized and
directed the "Homo Habilis Atelier". A collective art school of 11
teachers and varying numbers of students. It housed classes in all areas of
ceramics, sculpture,
drawing, batik, and other areas of the arts. It was the first collective of its
kind in Bogota.
After several years of participating in the
artistic life of the city, "Homo Habilis" was transformed
into a traditional “apprenticeship” program. Its purpose was the creation
of unusual ceramic sculptures.
Apprentices participated in the creation of two sculptural installations: “The
Women”, a series of
23 sculptures portraying the condition of women, and “Reconstruction XX
Century",
an environmental ceramics installation in which 20 tons of clay and 3 tons of
cement were used.
It is a portrait of the immense masses of people that we are; a tale of our
being engaged and
embedded into the social conditionings of the roles of the families and their
power in a
traditional culture. It was exhibited at the site of "Homo Habilis Atelier",
becoming the first
alternative gallery of its kind in Bogota. It was a successful event. The show
was well attended
for over a year.
In 1988, I emigrated to the United States, where
I obtained my M.F.A. Since then I have been active
in the arts in both countries.
Community activism has been a necessary
component for the creation of most of my work.
Without the participation of apprentices, neighbors, friends, family and fellow
artists,
these pieces would not have been accomplished.
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