This week for Sunday Visit , we catch up with Porfirio Gutiérrez, a Contemporary Zapotec American textile artist based in Ventura, California, and Teotitlan del Valle, Oaxaca.
Porfirio Gutiérrez comes from a long line of traditional Zapotec weavers, and his art practice remains dedicated to the deep knowledge and spiritual dimensions of his ancestors. He uses traditional Zapotec knowledge of dyes and materials and reinterprets Zapotec weaving language to create pieces that speak to his creative vision of the complexity of the Americas.
The story of his art has been told in The New York Times, PBS, and the BBC World Service, London. Porfirio has also been featured in Vogue Magazine and the Smithsonian’s American Indian Magazine. In 2015, he received the Smithsonian Institution’s Artist in Leadership fellowship award. His work is in the collection of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American Indians, LACMA Los Angeles County Museum, and other major museums. If that’s not enough for you, a selection of Porfirio’s dye materials was also documented and added to Harvard Art Museums’ Forbes Pigment Collection, a world-renowned archive of artist materials.
He’s kind of a big deal.
Porfirio is also a dear friend of Botanical Colors and we are so excited to launch a class with him this Thursday! Get ready for a Oaxacan tour with Porfirio and a 9 day journey into the world of Zapotec traditions. It’s hard not to say “you won’t want to miss this,” but well, you won’t. You can find it live on this page at 9am Pacific/ Noon Eastern, Thursday, November 16th.
Until we open the opportunity to sign up for this color, fiber, food and music journey, get to know Porfirio a little more…
What and where is your first memory of color?
My first memory was of the red clothes used for our community ceremony as a child. I remember seeing my mother helping and monitoring the younger generation on the cultural protocols of dressing with red clothes for the ceremony.
How has color grown to mean more to you as you evolve as an artist?
I have always been aware of the importance of color in our culture as an artist, the source of the colors, and how to effectively transform the source into color has become my obsession and my responsibility to understand.
Talk about being a Zapotec artist and how you have reinterpreted what that means in terms of weaving and color over the years.
I’m not sure if I felt stuck as an artist, or maybe it was a feeling of being pressured by having always had to make money to feed the family. As an artist, I had to reclaim my right to imagination and further my independence from a standardized craft tradition that I grew up in. I acknowledge my experiences and the different layers of identity I carry that are native to Mexican and American-speaking Zapotec, Spanish, and English. All of these have contributed to how I now create and how I think of materials, designs, colors, and nature.
What artist or person is most influencing your work right now and why?
Jesus, because he represents resilience, love, patience, faith, and integrity.
You can channel important colors in the Zapotec tradition with cochineal insects, marigolds and pericon.
Follow Porfirio through his website or Instagram page.
Did you see one of our first ever FEEDBACK FRIDAY episodes with Porfirio Gutiérrez? Watch here.
Narayan Khandekar who oversees the Forbes Pigment Collection joined Porfirio for an alumni conversation on color and restoration. The two had mini-presentations of their work and then engaged in a wonderful and intimate conversation about color coming from their own unique work. Watch here.