02/08/2026
BIG ANNOUNCEMENT!
“I’m deeply honored that this piece—and Alejandro’s mask—will live together in a permanent museum collection. This image represents lineage, place, and the shared human language of art that transcends borders.”
As a South East Texan native (Livingston), I'm very honored to announce that the Art Museum of Southeast Texas in Beaumont will be adding a Greg Davis Photography piece to their permanent collection entitled "El Orgullo (pride) de Juxtlahuaca". Juxtlahuaca is a small village in the indigenous Mixtec region of NW Oaxaca, Mexico. Along with the image, the museum will be adding a hand carved diablo mask from Master Folk artist, Alejandro VERA Guzman. Alejandro carved all of the masks you see in the image.
What makes this so special is that Alejandro's daughter, Blanca is the one dancing in the front of the photo, hence, "The Pride of Juxtlahuaca". This image also relates to the cultural significance and deep meaning behind Alejandro's art. The devil masks harken back to the Spaniards arrival in the new world, spreading Catholicism and making awares the omnipresence temptations of El Diablo and the price paid for violating the Word.
When my latest exhibition, Oaxacan Gold, premiered at the Art Center Waco, Alejandro and his wife, also named Blanca, were in Waco for the opening. They spent time with me and Amy in Austin and we took them down to Wimberley. None us spoke much of the others language but we were able to have some great conversations. While walking along the river there, Alejandro had an ah ha moment and shared that the trees growing by the river there were in the same family as the trees that he used in Mexico to carve his masks.....Montezuma Cypress! He told us that they never cut down a tree, it always falls naturally, and it falls heavy. Because of the proximity of the cypress trees to water, they are full of water. He said it takes about a year and half to two years for the water to fully evaporate from a fallen tree, but once it has dried, he starts his work. The nature of the water cavities left, presents a porous canvas to carve from, leaving the wood much softer, allowing him to create much more texture in the beards and overall in his carvings.
I hope to be able to bring Oaxacan Gold to another museum and/or art center. The Texas Commission on the Arts and National Arts Endowment has funded it in the past but funding for the arts has come under attack.
To learn more visit the virtual tour at
http://tinyurl.com/oaxacangoldvituraltour
Special thanks to my guides, Rodion Gorin, Sharon Knauss and Ferchow.
Humbled to be in this collection. AMSET’s permanent collection represents over 430 artists, including: Robert Rauschenberg, John Alexander, Maude Carron, Dixie Friend Gay, Carlomagno Pedro Martinez and Jacobo Ángeles Ojeda both in Oaxacan Gold), Angélica Delfina Vásquez Cruz, James Surls, Mary McCleary, Billy Hassell, Celia Eberle, Johnnie Swearingen, Burgess Dulaney, David Cargill, Felix “Fox” Harris, David Bates and Jesús Moroles.
And fellow photographers:
Paul Caponigro
Keith Carter
James Evans
Robert Langham
ORufus Lovett
