Spotlight:
Photo exhibit shows different sides of Selena.
John Dyer had two photo sessions with Tejano superstar Selena in her lifetime, and he encountered two very different women.
The first was in 1992, when her career in Tejano music was starting to catch fire. Dyer had been hired to take her photo for the cover of Más magazine. She drove herself to his photography studio in a red hatchback packed with costumes so they would have plenty of options. They worked together for about 10 hours.
“In ’92, she was full of life and the world was before her and everything was possible,” Dyer said.
Three years later, they reunited for a shoot at the Majestic Theatre slated to run with a profile of Selena in Texas Monthly.
She had become internationally famous and had started working on “Dreaming of You,” which was expected to be her big crossover album. She came to the studio after working for two days on an ad for Cocacola and was clearly exhausted.
“You could see it on her face,” Dyer said. “You could see it in her body. And what I tried to do is just go with that.
“She was quieter. She was willing to allow me to photograph her, but I didn’t want to push that.”
Images from those shoots — five on the walls and 25 in a slide show — are on display in “Selena Forever/siempre Selena,” a small but moving exhibit at the Mcnay Art Museum. The images are augmented by theatrical lighting and by the Tejano icon’s music, as well as a red curtain where visitors are encouraged to strike Selena-like poses for selfies.
Looking at the images he took all those years ago now, Dyer said, two things come to mind.
“I’m proud of what I did,” he said. “The other is the extraordinary young lady that’s in these pictures. You could have substituted any other nicelooking, graceful young lady in these pictures, they wouldn’t be the same. They just wouldn’t.”
The show is a teaser for
“Fashion Nirvana: Runway to Everyday,” an exhibit zeroing in on ’90s fashion opening Jan. 30. “When we were brainstorming about ’90s fashion icons, we all really coalesced around Selena as a great example of that,” said Kate Carey, who curated both exhibits and leads the museum’s education program. “What I love about her is that not only is she known as this internationally renowned singer, she was such an architect of her own image and her own style.”
Initially, the idea was to feature Selena in the larger exhibit, but as Carey and other Mcnay staffers talked to Dyer, they decided to break those images out.
“It seemed as though it might be a better opportunity to make it its own exhibition, and really give it the geographic presence
What: “Selena Forever/siempre Selena,” a photo exhibit spotlighting the Tejano star
When: On display through July 5
Where: Mcnay Art Museum, 6000 N. New Braunfels Ave.
Admission: Included with museum admission — $10-$20; free for Mcnay members, children 12 and younger, active-duty military and SNAP, WIC and MAP recipients. Admission is free to everyone from 4 to 9 p.m. Thursdays and noon to 5 p.m. the first Sunday of each month.
Info: mcnayart.org; 210-8245368.
that it needs,” Carey said.
The exhibit also is intended as a way to tie San Antonio to the fashion exhibit, said Rich Aste, the museum’s director and CEO, noting Selena’s connections to the city.
“She represented the very best of South Texas,” Aste said.
Dyer’s second photo session with her came not long before the 23-year-old singer was killed at a Corpus Christi hotel by the president of her fan club. When Dyer heard about her death, he was struck by the senselessness of it.
“It ended up taking the life of this bright flame,” he said. “I was probably not as upset as everybody, but I was damn upset. Because I have a stake in her. I’ve gotten to know her. I’ve kind of dialed into her universe, and so, yeah, something got taken way from me, too. I resent it.”
The photos he took of her capture some of what made her special. He pointed to an image of her looking a bit somber: “I’d say, ‘Don’t smile’ and she’d do that. And I’d say ‘Don’t smile’ again, and she couldn’t hold it. That’s how much life was inside that child.”
dlmartin@express-news.net | Twitter: @Deborahmartinen