ARTIST IN RESIDENCE RECIPIENTS
2024- Mestre Jamaika (Mauro Romualdo)
Mestre Jamaika is an internationally recognized practitioner of the Afro-Brazilian art form of capoeira, and has engaged and positively impacted students and audiences of all ages and backgrounds for over 30 years. Born in the heart of Capoeira’s birthplace and his ancestral land, he’s passionate about honoring his roots by sharing Afro-Brazilian culture and strengthening the community through his work.
Mestre would like to use the time at Alta to explore how capoeira, an art form that was developed and cultivated outside in nature, and use it to reflect on our water, with the Wasatch mountains being the source. Our water crisis in Utah is one he cares deeply about since I’ve lived here for 25 years. My community in Brazil is also experiencing a water crisis that echoes Utah’s in some ways. His parents were born in “quilombos” (communities originating from settlements of Afro-Brazilians who were enslaved) where capoeira was formed. Mestre’s grandparents were farmers, and as a young child he often walked with his grandma to get water from the river. Over the years, their land has been stolen and exploited by a billion-dollar industry that uses destructive monoculture farming practices, polluting and exhausting our essential water sources. Mestre wants to highlight both of these crises and build awareness through his work, and his exploration of movement in nature at Alta can help him with that goal.
2023- Izzy Anderson
Izzy Anderson has a multi-faceted career as both a professional musician and an award-winning artist. Her true passions are helping kids and community involvement. She is a licensed foster parent and was fortunate enough to foster two elementary aged sisters last year. She currently provides respite, which is taking foster children for the weekend when foster families need help or a break. She also partners with a local San Antonio nonprofit to play piano every week for patients, caregivers, and staff throughout area hospitals and rehab facilities.
During her artist residency, she worked on her first children’s supplementary piano book. Izzy understands what her students struggle with musically and technically. What makes this project special is that each song is based on her travels with accompanying art, painted by her. Each 2-page spread features a song inspired by somewhere Izzy visited and a painting from the same location. There are also some activity pages to go along with some of the music, to introduce and/or reiterate musical concepts.
2022- Ty Nathan Clark
Ty Nathan Clark is an artist, writer, and award-winning film producer. His work is represented across the US from LA, SF, to Houston and NY. My uncle Conway “Jiggs” Pierson, the world-renowned Sculptor and Raku artist, impacted my drive and passion for the arts at an early age. Ty lives and works from his studio in Waco, Texas with his wife Mande and he is constantly engaged in the art scene on an international level, showing work and mentoring artists.
From his artist statement: “Life has a genesis and a resolution. Many of us struggle with an interpretation of the personal story we are creating. My work takes a critical view of the human memory. In my work, I deconstruct a collaboration of ideas and experiences that exist from our childhood to our adulthood.”
2021 - Sophia Matzikos
Sophia Matzikos is a multidisciplinary artist that specializes in sculpture, textiles, and photography. Sophia focuses on the aesthetics, functionality, and implications of natural, organic materials and their applications. Her work questions the socio-ecological issue of excessive consumption and explores renewable natural resources as both a functional and aesthetic remedy. She enjoys challenging material usage, searching for unconventional alternatives. She has found success in working with food waste, agar, collagen, and pectin as bio-making materials. Her work a series of experiments that incorporates the use of both raw and found materials allows her to discover and push a chosen material’s functional and aesthetics limits, ultimately culminating in sculptures that speak to broader social and ecological issues.
Hatzikos received her Bachelor of Arts degree from Wheaton College, MA with a double major in Visual Art and Economics. She teaches sculpture in the Upper School at the Oregon Episcopal School located in Portland Oregon.
