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Sierra Kondos

Special to the News

 “Port Arthur is a piece of my heart because I was born there. My parents still live there. My roots are there,” Evita Tezeno, said. The Dishman Art Museum will exhibit, “Piece of my Heart,” a selection of works by the acclaimed artist Evita Tezeno, until March 8, 2025, in their main gallery. This exhibition brings Tezeno’s vibrant and richly textured collage paintings back to Southeast Texas, where her artistic journey began.

Evita Tezeno is a native of Port Arthur, Texas who graduated from Lamar University in 1984 with a Bachelor of Science degree in graphic design. She uses hand-painted papers and found objects to create folk-art style collages inspired by her South Texas roots, family, and personal experiences.

“In the early 90’s I participated in my first group art show in Houston,” Tezeno said. “I submitted impression pieces and people were saying that my work was derivative, because they said everybody does Impressionism. So, I prayed, and I asked the Lord to give me some ideas to do something different.”

Tezeno said that was when she had a dream that an angel came to her door.

“At first, I thought it was a person,” she said. “I didn’t know who it was, and I asked where they were from and they replied, ‘I’m a messenger from your father. I want to give you something from your father. I said, ‘My father, Earl?’ And they said, ‘No, from your heavenly father. I’m a messenger from your heavenly Father, and I want to give you something that will help you to be successful.”

She said the angel handed a blueprint of another style that would help her artwork and help her to become successful. Her art was transformed to mixed-media collage.

“I started looking at sketches,” she said. “Then I started drawing the sketches, and I produced two pieces. After I completed them, I got a call from my mentor and they said, ‘I have this guy who has this festival he’s doing and he’s participating in. It’s not a festival that he’s doing, but he needs artwork for the poster.”

 The festival turned out to be the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival in New Orleans and the artwork was for the Congo Square poster.

“When he looked at the piece that I did, he said, ‘yes,’ and I was chosen, and I was the first woman that was chosen for the Congo Square poster in 1999. The same year, the people at Essence Music Festival saw my work, and then they commissioned me to do the poster for their music festival.”

Tezeno said this was the jumping point for her career.

“I got picked up by a gallery in Hagerstown, Maryland around that time,” she said. “I got picked up by these were smaller galleries. But it wasn’t until I got on Instagram in 2018 when I started getting a lot more publicity, and noticed I had a platform where people all over the country were seeing my work, not just in a gallery or on their website, but it was whoever clicked on my image. What really helped me is when Denzel Washington bought my work from a gallery that was representing me in New York.”

Tezeno said that was when she thought, “I made it.”

“In 2020, Samuel L. Jackson bought my work,” she said. “He sent me a message and said, ‘Oh, I love this piece, I would like to buy it for my wife for our 40th anniversary. And I said, ‘Well, I have a better piece than that,’ I had a larger piece, and I sent him an image of it, and he said, he said, ‘I want that piece.’ And so, I sent him my phone number and he said, ‘Well, how can I purchase it?’ So, I sent him my phone number, and I thought his assistant would call me. Fifteen minutes later, the guy called me himself, and he said, ‘This is Sam.’ And I said, ‘Hold a minute, Mr. Jackson, I have to get myself together because my stomach just fell on the floor,’ and he started laughing.”

Tezeno created two 6-feet by 9-feet sized pieces for her exhibit at the Dishman Art Museum that encapsulates her memories of growing up in Port Arthur.

“My current gallery challenged me to make two strong pieces that summed up my childhood,” she said. “I guess those are the most impressive memories that I remember as a child. McFadden Beach is where we went every summer, so I have very fond memories of when my cousins came from out of town and we would spend time together there.  And we would also go to the Hollywood Theater. It was almost like an escape, because I grew up sometimes with my grandmother, and my grandmother was very strict. I figured I would sneak out and I would go to the theater and see people like me on a big screen. I thought that was the coolest thing.”

She uses hand-painted papers and found objects to create folk-art style collages inspired by her South Texas roots, family, and personal experiences.

“I begin my process by painting paper for a couple of days,” she said. “I tint it, and after it dries, I put the pattern on there by using stencils, using stamps and things like that. And then when I want to do the actual piece, I pull out the paper and I decide where I’m going to use that piece. I don’t have any rhyme or reason for the patterns that I use.”

Tezeno said she utilizes her background in Graphic Design to help create her art.

“I use color theory and proposition,” she said. “In college, I learned how to make things look aesthetically pleasing, and how many times we were supposed to repeat a spur of color and have it asymmetrical. Once I do the sketch and transfer it on the canvas, everything is very impromptu after that because it becomes very intuitive. The canvas, the image, starts talking to me and telling me, How should I set the mood.’ I don’t plan the colors; I don’t plan the patterns. I don’t plan any of that. I just plan the sketches. And then after that it’s all impromptu.”

To see her exhibit, visit the Dishman Art Museum located at 1030 E. Lavaca in Beaumont, Texas.