Museum of New Mexico Media Center Press Release

Master Apprenticeship Showcase and Holiday Pop Up Market Inspired by “Today’s Global Marketplace,” an Exhibition-in-the-Making

Museum of International Folk Art

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
November 14, 2016

MEDIA CONTACT

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Nov. 14, 2016 (Santa Fe, NM) On Sunday, Dec. 4, 2016, from 1pm to 4pm, the Museum of International Folk Art presents a Holiday Pop Up Market comprised of six New Mexican artists and their apprentices who have been working together for the past six months. The afternoon of activities and art sales will demonstrate the intergenerational transfer of knowledge, skills and spirit within the community of traditional jewelers, potters, and fiber artists of New Mexico. Master artists featured in the Showcase include: -National Heritage Award winner Irvin and Lisa Trujillo (Chimayo weavers) -Julia Gomez, Spanish Colcha embroiderer -Ray Garcia, San Felipe Pueblo jeweler -Kathy Wan Povi Sanchez, San Ildefonso potter (great granddaughter of Maria Martinez) -Louie Garcia, Tiwa and Piro Pueblo weaver and natural dyer -Gasali Adeyemo, Yoruba Nigerian indigo dye artist and fiber artist—immigrant living in Santa Fe

This program is held in conjunction with the current exhibition-in-the-making in the Mark Naylor and Dale Gunn Gallery of Conscience at the Museum of International Folk Art, “Negotiate, Navigate, Innovate: Strategies Folk Artists Use In Today’s Global Marketplace.”

Activities start at 1 p.m. at the Museum, which is on Museum Hill. For the first 90 minutes, the artist and apprentice teams will speak about their journeys and show a short video story they produced together. The last 90 minutes provides opportunities to interact with visitors and sell their pieces.

“The Museum of International Folk Art has been asking tough questions about the global marketplace for some time,” said Khristaan D. Villela, Director of the Museum of International Folk Art. “As the world becomes more globalized, high tech, and commodified, what continues is the meaning, value, and significance of handmade folk arts,” he said.  

One response to the pressure of the marketplace is to seek strength through cross-generational collaboration. This happens when Ray Garcia, a San Felipe Pueblo jeweler, and his daughter Monica Lovato, work together. Ray teaches Monica his tradition-based techniques, while Monica brings in new ideas about metallurgy, technology and designs that will appeal to her Millennial generation.

"In our traditional ways, teaching is always two ways: from the young to the elders and from the elders to the young,” said Ray Garcia, aka Rayducks. “It’s exciting to see what the young see. We’re looking at the same material, the same design, but we interpret it differently. To be an artist you have to change. The connection is like a tree, my family are the roots. I get my nourishment from them."  

The Showcase and the exhibit are generously supported, in part, through an Art Works award from the National Endowment for the Arts. Additional funding from Mark Naylor & Dale Gunn, the McCune Family Foundation, the International Folk Art Foundation, and the Museum of New Mexico Foundation.

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MUSEUM OF INTERNATIONAL FOLK ART The Museum of International Folk Art is a division of the New Mexico Department of Cultural Affairs.

The Museum of International Folk Art’s mission is "to enrich the human spirit by connecting people with the arts, traditions and cultures of the world." Founded in 1953 by Florence Dibell Bartlett, the museum holds the world’s largest international folk art collection of more than 150,000 objects from six continents and over 150 nations.

The museum’s collections represent a broad range of global artists whose artistic expressions make Santa Fe an international crossroads of culture. For many visitors, fascination with folk art begins upon seeing the whimsical toys and traditional objects within the Girard Collection. For others, the international textiles, ceramics, carvings and other cultural treasures in the Neutrogena Collection provide the allure.  The museum’s historic and contemporary Latino and Hispano folk art collections, spanning the Spanish Colonial period to modern-day New Mexico, reflect how artists respond to their time and place in ways both delightful and sobering. In 2010, the museum opened the Mark Naylor and Dale Gunn Gallery of Conscience, where exhibitions encourage visitors to exchange ideas on complex issues of human rights and social justice.

Over 90,000 national and international visitors visit the Museum International Folk Art every year. Through folk art, the museum encourages all to find a common ground upon which to craft better lives for all.  Museum exhibitions and programs are supported by donors to the Museum of New Mexico Foundation and its Director’s Leadership Fund, Exhibitions Development Fund, and Fund for Museum Education, as well as by the International Folk Art Foundation, also established by museum founder Florence Dibell Bartlett.

Media Contact: Jennifer Padilla 505-577-1347 jennpadilla@newmexico.com

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