A BLIND Mexican sculptor has inspired many by continuing with his beautiful ceramic works after completely losing sight.
Jose Garcia Antonio has been working to create mythical creatures sculpted from clay, with visions from a rural childhood and indigenous women.
“My sight was completely gone, but I didn’t lose hope, nor become sad or bitter. No. As a man I looked at my life and said to myself, ‘that’s it’,“ Jose said.
Having dedicated his life to art, Jose lost his sight to glaucoma at age 55.
Yet he says the visions of what he sculpts are still fresh in his mind, and that he has learned to see with his hands.
“I discovered that my senses of feeling and hearing were stronger, and I began to work again. Now I feel that I can see, but through my touch, because I can make figures using my hands as if they were my sight.
When I had my vision, I don’t believe I sculpted as well as I do now,“ Jose added.
His wife, Santareyna Mendoza, has always stood by his side.
“I admire him, because he was never sad. He would tell me, Don’t cry because I’m a man, I’m the head of this household and I’m going to work,“ she said.
Jose Garcia Antonio is known in art circles around the world for his ceramic sculptures, and in an art gallery in the Oaxaca State capital, his works go on display and sale.
Eric Chavez is the gallery’s curator, and works to promote Jose’s works.
“Maestro Jose Garcia, he’s an icon for Oaxacan folk art. The level of detail that we find in his work is also really inspiring to us, to give him spaces like this for recognition and exhibitions. So, yeah, it’s quite something to look at his work and look at him working,“ Chavez said. — Reuters
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