Bill Gilbert: Mata Ortiz
CAE2106
Summary Note
Bill Gilbert began visiting and working with the potters of Mata Ortiz in 1991. These archive materials are a definitive record of Mata Ortiz ceramic evolution during the 1990s.Biographical Note
New Mexico artist Bill Gilbert completed his undergraduate work in studio art at Swarthmore College and Pitzer College, where he studied with ceramists Paul Soldner and Dennis Parks. Gilbert did his graduate work with Rudi Autio and Ken Little at the University of Montana and received his MFA in 1978. Gilbert served on the faculty in the Department of Art and Art History at the University of New Mexico from 1988 until becoming professor emeritus in 2016. He directed the Ceramics program at UNM from 1988-2000. He then founded the Land Arts of the American West program in 2000 and was appointed the Lannan Chair in 2004. Gilbert subsequently co-founded the Art & Ecology emphasis in studio art at UNM in 2007. He has exhibited his place-based, mixed media, and video works in galleries and museums across the world, including at the Center for Art + Environment at the Nevada Museum of Art. He is also a curator and writer focusing on indigenous artists from U.S. pueblos, Mexico, and Ecuador. In 2009 he co-authored Land Arts of the American West (University of Texas Press) and in 2012 published Arid Lands Pedagogy: Art in the American West (Routledge).
Scope and Content
Bill Gilbert began visiting and working with the potters of Mata Ortiz in 1991. The village was transformed by a resident, Juan Quezada, who re-discovered/created pottery-making skills from the nearby ancient Casas Grandes tradition, and then adapted it to contemporary pottery of his own design, an evolution that took years. By the end of that time, the entire village had begun to engage in making pots, which completely invigorated the economy and life of the village. Gilbert was in the vanguard of Anglo collectors, and became a champion of the work through exhibitions, books, and events. His materials are a definitive record of Mata Ortiz ceramic evolution during the 1990s and overlap with his Land Arts of the American West curriculum and other pedagogical activities, as well as with his personal art making practice. Materials include photographs, slides, documents, catalog drafts, and exhibition ephemera.
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Related Publications
University of New Mexico Art Museum. The Potters of Mata Ortiz: Five Barrios, Seven Families. Albuquerque: NM: University of New Mexico Press, 1999.
Artez de México. Cerámica de Mata Ortiz. México: Artes de México, 1999.
California State University, Fullerton. Juan Quezada and the New Tradition. Fullerton, CA: California State University, Fullerton, 1979.
Christman, Ernest H. Casas Grandes Pre-Columbia Pottery Decoded. Albuquerque, NM: Tutorial Press, 2002.
Collins, John E. A Tribute to Lucy M. Lewis: Acoma Potter. Fullerton, CA: Museum of North Orange County, 1975
Gilbert, Bill. Mata Ortiz, 1995-2015. Santa Fe, NM: University of New Mexico Art Museum, 2015
Hayes, Allan. Collections of Southwestern Pottery: Candlesticks to Canteens, Frogs to Figurines. Flagstaff, AZ: Northland Publishing, 1998.
Hayes, Allan. Pottery of the Southwest: An Ancient Art and Modern Traditions. Botley, Oxford, UK: Shire Publications, 2012.
Hayes, Allan. Southwestern Pottery: Anasazi to Zuni. Flagstaff, AZ: Northland Publishing, 1996.
King, Charles S. Spoken Through Clay: Native Pottery of the Southwest. Santa Fe, NM: Museum of New Mexico Press, 2017.
Mata Ortiz Pottery: An inside look. Written and Directed by Ron Goebel and Nancy Andrews. Bisbee, AZ: Casa Melón Productions, 1997. DVD.
Mata Ortiz today. Produced by Bill Gilbert; directed by Bill Gilbert and John Donalds. Cerrillos, NM: Dos Feos Productions, 2000. DVD.
Mata Ortiz: The untold stories. Produced by Ron Goebel. Cayucos, CA: Mata Ortiz Pottery, 2015. DVD.
Paddock, Ana Livingston. Mata Ortiz: The Art of Survival, The Survival of Art. Chihuahua, Mexico: Casa Aurora Publications, 2011.
Parks, Walter P. The Miracle of Mata Ortiz: Juan Quezada and the Potters of Northern Chihuahua. Riverside, CA: Coulter Press, 1993.
Schaaf, Gregory. Southern Pueblo Pottery: 2,000 Artist Biographies. Santa Fe, NM: CIAC Press, 2002.
Shields. Scott A. Pueblo Dynasties: Master Potters from Matriarchs to Contemporaries. Sacramento, CA: Crocker Art Museum, 2019.
The Potters of Mata Ortiz. Babara Goffin. Woodstock, NY: Barbara Goffin, 1994. DVD.
The Renaissance of Mata Ortiz. Produced by Scott Petersen. s.l.: Mata Ortiz Productions, 2011. DVD.
University of New Mexico. The Potters of Mata Ortiz: Five Barrios, Seven Families. Albuquerque, NM: University of New Mexico Art Museum, 1999.