He’s back! And if you missed seeing Zarco Guerrero perform last October, you have a chance to see his masterpiece performance, Face to Face in a Frenzy on Saturday, February 19 at 2 p.m. at the Museum of Northern Arizona. In this one-man play, Guerrero uses masks to create multiple characters who connect you with many rich cultures, and communicate multiple messages for life today. This performance is free with the regular Museum admission fee.
Guerrero will also teach a mask making workshop earlier in the day on Saturday, February 19 from 10 a.m. to noon. This is a chance to sit with the master and learn ancient traditions of mask making. The fee for the workshop is only $10, thanks to a generous and anonymous donor’s contribution to the Museum.
“As a sculptor and mask maker,” says Zarco, “…I aspire to enhance the ordinary with the interesting juxtaposition of ancient and primal imagery superimposed on the modern world.”
Zarco Guerrero has been a force in the Arizona art scene since the early 1970s as a ground breaking artist and community arts advocate. He works in many different media to build a modern interpretation of ancient traditions. For years, Zarco’s work has been drawing national and international attention. In 1984, PBS broadcast nationally a one-hour documentary about his art entitled The Mask of El Zarco. In 1986 he was awarded the prestigious Japan Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts and spent one year in Kyoto, Japan, studying Noh masks as an apprentice to Joshun Fukakusa. From Japan, the artist also investigated mask carving in Bali, Indonesia, and China.
In 1990, Guerrero received the Arizona Commission on the Arts Artist Project Grant to pursue his mask carving in Mexico. He was the mask maker for La Mascarada la Vida, a play by Childsplay, Inc., in which he also played the lead male and co-composed the musical score. This play was featured at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C.
In 1991, the Institute for Studies in the Arts at Arizona State University and its dance department performed A Song for the Forest People, a dance and opera written by Guerrero in which over 30 of his masks were featured.
In 1993 he was awarded the Arizona’s Governor’s Arts Award for his artistic contributions to the community, in 1994 he was the recipient of the Scottsdale Arts Council’s Chairman’s Artist Award, and in 1998 he completed a larger-than-life size bronze sculpture of farm worker leader César Chávez that was commissioned by the City of Phoenix.
You can also currently see a superb sampling of Guerrero’s work at MNA’s exhibit, Caras y Máscaras: Faces and Masks, open through April 25. His works include an array of pieces that will stimulate your dreams and boggle your mind.
In his words, “Caras y Máscaras is a celebration of diversity, blending elements of Mexican, American, Canadian, Japanese, and Balinese mask making traditions. This exhibit is important historically because over 90 percent of the artwork exhibited has been utilized in performance and has served a valuable function in cultural life. Caras y Máscaras is a testament to a once-dying mask making tradition, brought back to life and thriving in Arizona.”
The Museum of Northern Arizona sits at the base of the San Francisco Peaks and is located three miles north of historic downtown Flagstaff on Highway 180. It is open daily from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. and admission is $5/adult, $4/senior, $3/student, $2/child (7-17), and always free to members. For further information, call 928/774-5213 or log on to www.musnaz.org.