Artist Josephine Sacabo returns to the city where her life began, bringing with her with a career-spanning retrospective exhibition that opens July 28th at the TAMIU Fine and Performing Arts Gallery
Educated at Bard College in New York, she lived in France and England before settling in New Orleans in 1973, where she continues to live and work, dividing her time there and in San Miguel de Allende.
That’s the story of her life in short form.
The longer, amazing account is that the accomplished artist has over the past five decades created an internationally recognized body of work distinguished by her use of historic photographic processes and handcrafted artist books.
Sacabo’s exhibit, The Right to Dream – regreso a mi pueblo, brings together five major bodies of work — El Mundo Inalcanzable de Susana San Juan, Óyeme Con Los Ojos, Juana and the Structures of Reverie, Barking at God, and TAGGED. Working in a subjective, introspective style, Sacabo uses literature as the genesis of much of her work. Her portfolios are visual manifestations of the written word, where image and language exist in conversation.
The catalog for this exhibit, which is available at tragaluzjournal.org, includes Sacabo’s narrative for the genesis and meaning of each of the five series.
UNPACKING, CURATING, INSTALLING
THE PRECIOUS CARGO OF SACABO’S WORK
The Fine and Performing Arts (FPA) Gallery at Texas A&M International University has been energized with the curatorial expertise of artists Jesse Shaw and Kassandra Romero and photographer and 3-D digital modeling ace Nicholas Lewis, who have had the rare, unique experience of unpacking, organizing, and hanging the work of Josephine Sacabo.
“It has been enriching, exciting, and moving to unbox the tools, artifacts, and art That are a story-telling component about Josephine and her work,” said TAMIU art instructor and print maker Shaw. “And then there’s the experience of coming face to face with the art. Some of the prints are framed and under glass. The ones that aren’t under glass allow a look at the ink, which offers yet another story about the artist and her method,” he added.
According to Shaw, Lewis’ precise measurements of the walls determine the equidistant placement of the works organized in the five series that will fill the gallery walls.
“Once they are on the wall, you see them individually and look at content. When you see them in their series, you begin to experience the narrative Sacabo is communicating,” Shaw said.
Romero and Lewis are on the staff of the non-profit Daphne Art Foundation whose founder, Alyssa Cigarroa, invited Sacabo to exhibit in Laredo. Romero is the foundation’s program coordinator, and Lewis is its program manager.
Romero spoke of the evident care that went into packing
Sacabo’s art for travel to Laredo from New Orleans. “You could see the respect that went into it, which we handled in the same way as we unpacked,” Romero observed, adding, “There were so many beautiful details to see up close in Ms. Sacabo’s work. The educational part of the exhibit that explained the processes of her work, that was impressive.”
Shaw credited the members of the TAMIU staff instrumental in their preparation for the opening of the exhibit, naming them: administrative associate Laura R. Moran; Javier Zambrano of the Office of Institutional Advancement; Janice Lardy, instructional assistant professor; Callan Johnson, gallery assistant; and a gentleman who goes solely by the name of “Mata.”
By all accounts from those who have worked here a good part of a year to bring the exhibit to Laredo, Sacabo’s publicist in New Orleans, Jenny Bagert, was the pivot upon which the exhibit turned from an initial phone conversation and many moving parts into this breathtaking exhibit of Sacabo’s work.
Bagert’s voice on the other end of the line had the blueprint for this exhibit. She kindly directed us, asked questions and answered many,
“Jenny Bagert takes on everything a hundred percent. She is serious, organized, competent, effective, and very actively committed to detail. I hand her parts of my life, and she comes through with everything she says she will do,” Sacabo said.
Bagert, however, modestly downplayed her vital orchestration of a major art exhibit by remote control 662 miles from Laredo. “I’m only part of the small village, all women, that Josephine entrusts with many aspects of her work and exhibitions.”
Continuing her praises, this writer commends Bagert for her skills as a wordsmith, much admired.
