Lila Gongora
Staff Writer
The “AIR 2026: Compulsion” exhibit at the American Museum of Ceramic Art in Pomona features work by artists Maxwell Henderson, Yoon Hwang, Bianca MacPherson, and Kristy Moreno made during their time in residency at AMOCA. The exhibit serves as a commentary on various societal issues through colorful vessels and intricate textures.
All four artists spent a series of months at AMOCA where they worked on their pieces.
Henderson serves as the AMOCA Ceramics Studio manager and MacPherson and Moreno remain in residency offering artist workshops. Hwang is currently renting out a studio here, while his work remains on display in the exhibit.
“This is what I do, I have to do this,” Hwang said. “Clay is fun because it feels natural to me since it’s from the Earth, it’s what we’re from and will come back to.”
Hwang uses a playful style in his ceramics, composed of abstract colors and textures. He includes human elements in his ceramics like big eyes or tongues sticking out of mouths that he says has a lot to do with his son and being able to create something with elements he can easily identify then interpret like an eye or mouth. Coming from a Korean household, Hwang combines forms of western and eastern ideals when creating art as a necessary part of his life.
Hana Hunter, a senior at Pomona College, attended the exhibit and explained that she is taking a ceramics class currently. She enjoys pieces that reflect parts of human characteristics.
“I’ve really enjoyed making things with my hands,” Hunter said. “I really like the pieces that look like faces, I love the big beady eyes in ‘Toon Omni’ by Hwang.”
Moreno portrays a unique vision for future women of color through statue-like figures often dressed in crop tops, bold makeup and holding spray paint bottles. Her work conveys reimagined future ancestors heavily influenced by her own previous illustrative work and her upbringing in the Los Angeles and Orange County areas, which she was submerged in Chicanx culture that she adapted from her own aunts and uncles.
She stresses the importance of having a Latinx community filled with people who are emotionally well, especially in sisterhood for women, and friendships for all people in her art.
“I think it’s important to keep touching base on that heritage, that culture, and background to have people understand where I come from and what our community has gone through,” Moreno said.
Both Hwang and Moreno started their journey in ceramics about ten years ago when a professor from each of their institutions presented them with an opportunity to hone in on their skills in ceramics.
MacPherson has a background in photography and works with archival materials that reflect the American, specifically Los Angeles, landscape. Her work consists of lots of mirroring with a mixture of glazes and how they function in the lives of women and people of color; by setting them in clay they become undeniable.
For this exhibit, MacPherson conducted research with the Miriam Matthew Photograph Collection drawn to the partially recorded lives of Black and mixed-race families. This inspired her pieces with a feeling of obligation to tell these people’s stories.
The pieces by Henderson display a wheel spun contradiction of dark and bright colors displaying structured societal systems through vessels and an unpredictable visible movement and pushback of the glaze or “goop.” The glaze that spills over their proper position exemplifies joy in deviating from normalities.
One piece portrays a large roughly textured vessel with colorful melted glaze around it. Here, a structure is present as the glaze adds life to the piece, representing playfulness and a part of oneself that desires abnormality.
The exhibit runs through May 31, with an artist panel happening on May 1.
Artists MacPherson and Moreno offer artist workshops at AMOCA.
The museum is open from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Friday to Sunday.
Lila Gongora can be reached at lila.gongora@laverne.edu.
Lila Gongora is a sophomore communications major with a concentration in public relations. She is the LV Life editor for the Campus Times and previously served as a staff writer.
Jasmine Lyn is a sophomore photography major and photography editor for the Campus Times. She is also a staff photographer for La Verne Magazine and a former staff photographer for the Campus Times. Her work can also be found at Jazzylyn.com
