Koyoltzintli
Bio/CV: Koyoltzintli, is an interdisciplinary artist, healer, and educator living in the USA. She grew up on the pacific coast and the Andean mountains in Ecuador, these are geographies that permeate her work. She focuses on sound, ancestral technologies, ritual, and storytelling through collaborative processes and personal narratives. Intersectional theories and earth-based healing inform her practice. Nominated for Prix Pictet in 2019, her work has been exhibited in the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, DC, the United Nations, Aperture Foundation in NYC, and Paris Photo, among others. She has been an artist in residence in the US, France, and Italy and has taught at CalArts, SVA, ICP, and CUNY. She has received multiple awards and fellowships including the Photographic Fellowship at the Musée du Quai Branly in Paris, the NYFA Fellowship, and the IA grant by the Queens Council of the Arts. Her first monograph Other Stories was published in 2017 by Autograph ABP, and her work was featured in the Native issue of Aperture Magazine (no. 240). In 2021, her work was included in the book Latinx Photography in the United States by Elizabeth Ferrer chief curator at BRIC. In 2022 she is one of the artists in residence at Socrates Sculpture Park and she has been awarded the Latinx Artist Fellowship by US Latinx Art Forum (USLAF).
Artist Statement: In my ongoing research-based work on acoustic ecologies centering on indigenous sound, I developed Siete poderes de la mar (7powers of the sea) in 2021. The project is a response to the ecological degradation of the ocean through oil spills and rising temperatures.
I reflect on my childhood and my relation to the ocean growing up in coastal Ecuador. By making these whistling vessels, I am in dialogue with the ancient makers of these instruments, but I am also speaking of our current challenging times. The whistling bottles are based on the acoustical principles of my ancestors. I use dark and white clay. I often decorate the dark clay with shells, corals, and materials I trade or purchase at powwows or other gatherings. For the white clay, I apply a post-firing technique using mica with pigment to create iridescent patterns that evoke the skies of my native land and the Bioluminescence of deep-sea creatures.
Social: @koyoltzintli