Frontier #16: Ako Castuera

By Ako Castuera. Published by Youth in Decline. 

Softcover, 32 pages, Colour Photography, 2018

A beautiful and captivating new collection of ceramics work by Ako Castuera.

Ako Castuera’s ceramic sculptures combine animal, human, landscape and architectural elements, describing an interwoven profusion of life that calls into question our hierarchically ordered beliefs around human / non-human, animate / inanimate. Her hybrid forms suggest a world of upended borders in which connections to people, place, self and other are vividly expressed in a variety of traditional techniques that often give way to unorthodox applications.

32 pages, Color photography, with author interview.

A native Angeleno, Ako’s roots carry rich material and intangible cultural heritage from Okinawa and Mexico into today’s American mainstream culture. Her sculptures and paintings have been exhibited in galleries and museums throughout the United States, and her work can also be seen in the popular animated television show, “Adventure Time,” for which she was a storyboard artist and writer for several seasons.