Xavier Villaluz - Clay Scavenger Hunt: Berlin!

Recently, I have been researching and learning about how I can better understand my local environment to develop art that is as locally connected to where I reside as possible. When examining ceramics, it is not always the most environmentally friendly medium, especially when considering the carbon footprint that mining and shipping places upon the world. These thoughts unsettle me and drive me toward wanting to increase my knowledge of geology, glaze chemistry and good artistic practice so that I can develop functional and aesthetically pleasing work that suggests the region the materials originate from.

My current work has been heavily involved in scavenger hunts. I chose scavenger hunts as a means to spread my art, and as a means to allow people the chance to pay for a piece in an alternative way: with their time–another bonus, hopefully seeing new areas. As of right now, the work that I use for scavenger hunts are unfired clay vessels containing native seeds, so that in case they are never found, they will decompose and hopefully sprout their little botanical passengers. However, I do wish to experiment further with low fire clay.

Besides being an alternative way of payment, I believe that interactive art will always be more memorable for viewers than static art as it will activate all of the senses, and, don’t we all need a bit more play in our lives?

The First in the "Clay Scavenger Hunt!" series, Berlin! I had attended a live-work program via CSU Summer Arts in 2022. Over the course of three weeks, I had explored some of the city, taking note of various locations and forms and figures that I found interesting.

Full Gallery Installation

Close-up of Directions

Map and Photo of Shrimpy

Map and Photo of Spinny

Map and photo of Stretchy

Close-up of Sassy's Map

Once I found some general areas to begin hiding pieces, I went to work forming the little sculptures(I had acquired some local stoneware and I made 16, I also did not fire them so they were susceptible to weathering) to hide away to be found later on, or not.

My general process was to hide away a sculpture, snap a photo, get the location's coordinates and then make a small roughly drawn birds-eye view map of the immediate area. Once I got the photo printed, I included a small riddle along with the coordinates.

The photo/map pairings were meant to be taken during the exhibit's run so that the actual pieces could be found