Almarza's work was shown July-November of 2007.
Alberto J. Almarza: Mummies and Pok
Pok:
“Pok”, a term coined in 2005 by my one year-old son, Javier Almarza, literally means “mud” or “art bread”, although the name Pok soon came to define a whole system of concepts, and possibly a new style of pottery (in my own head, at least). Pok could be considered as a category of “primitive pottery”, except in this case the term is not used purely aesthetically but it refers to the entire process. The basic premises behind the body of work that came to be known as Pok are the following:
- Pok is made only using natural clays that have been locally collected by the artist; no materials are ever bought.
- Pok is made using the hands as tools, no additional tools are used, and the decoration consists of fingerprints, nail marks, etc.
- The glazes for Pok pottery are also hand mixed from raw materials that are not purchased but recycled, reclaimed or found.
- The firing of Pok occurs only in outdoors fires or kilns that are made with the same material policies, no electricity or gas used.
- Pok is made to fit the individual’s particular proportions and interests, all the pieces are rather small (hand-size), yet no single Pok is the same as another, even when decoration is minimal (which is usually the case).
- Because of its material availability and wide range of exploration, Pok is open ended and intended for everybody. It focuses on taking the complex techniques of pottery back to an approach that is accessible, emphasizing the need for art methods to be available to all.
- Pok is not a goal-oriented art but it focuses on the process. Beauty in Pok is not defined in terms of form, line, value, etc, but the focus is instead in personality, gesture, honesty and simplicity. Therefore all Pok has beauty in it, despite cultural and aesthetic norm. In fact, Pok seeks to redefine the art community’s shallow understanding of beauty, which is on the surface.
- Pok praises the essence of clay without being ignorant of its ancient roots and contemporary developments, yet it takes the freedom to defy conventions and explore the rules as if for the first time.
Pok= Water+ Earth- Air+ Fire
Mummies:
The idea of creating mummies came from the desire to create art that was a sacred entity in itself, rather than a representation of one. Of course this limitation is impossible to overcome, but the degrees of value can at least be tampered with. Every aspect of the mummies is a result of a ritualized transmutation of materials; a micro model of life is created, then destroyed, and then preserved as a time capsule for eternity. The mummy is a cross section of life represented through death. The idea of value is essential to the mummies, since the cost of materials is minimum if present at all. The aesthetic of the mummies also takes second priority; the focus being on how to create an art object that is valuable for its meaning and energetic content, rather than its material constitution or initial appearance. But the mummies also have their existence attributed to a theme that is reoccurring in my art: The subtle and mysterious boundaries between the material and the spiritual realm, the body and the soul, the physical realm versus the realm of pure energy. The ultimate goal of this body of work is to create an appreciation of the hidden beauties of life and the importance of appreciating culture, by means of exploration in the terrain that spiritualizes matter and materializes spirit, which is the terrain of art itself.
