Moving Masterpieces: Airport Art Exhibits Present Work by Local and Award-Winning Artists

December 5, 2021 - North Side

By Jade Esteban Estrada, Staff Writer | San Antonio Sentinel

The San Antonio International Airport (SAT) and the Galleries @ SAT have unveiled their latest exhibitions by local and award-winning artists. Through mixed media, paint, and still photography, this rotating exhibit series aims to reflect the history and culture of the Alamo City. 

The Galleries @ SAT, whose purpose is to provide a sense of place throughout the city’s growing airports, is part of the City of San Antonio Aviation Department’s Arts and Culture Program. The program collaborates with local artists, educational and cultural institutions, and other community partners to help express the cultural identity of the region to the travelers and the local community. 

“The airport is constantly redefining itself, and adding more artwork showcases the talent that is here in San Antonio and around the globe,” said Jesus Saenz, Jr., director of airports at the San Antonio Airport System. 

Saenz hopes that residents, particularly art enthusiasts, will visit more than one of the airport’s pop-up galleries, emphasizing that each space highlights different artists and displays. 

“All of the pieces are a representation of who we are as a vibrant, creative community,” he said Friday. 

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The Galleries @ SAT will feature the following artists and exhibits:  

Giovanna DiZurita’s five-piece exhibit is on display in Terminal B by the baggage claim area.

From an early age, DiZurita “craved the fascinating world of lines and scribbles,” her bio explains. Art, even then, represented the emotional roller coaster of her teenage years, after experiencing the deportation of her dad, and later, staying alone in a strange place. During this time of turbulence and uncertainty, art validated her creative abilities as an artist. 

Today, her art pieces are a colorful composition of mixed media consisting of acrylics, oil paints, paper, fabric, and metal. Her work has been exhibited across Europe, North and Central America and can be found in the collections of art buyers like Mayor Ron Nirenberg and musician Steven Tyler of the band Aerosmith. 

“Art is happiness without boundaries, so make your life art and become a walking masterpiece,” DiZurita said in a statement on Friday. 

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Located in Terminal A along the wall of the TSA checkpoint is Gabe Zeckua’s drone photography exhibit, Perspectives from the Sky.

The Mexican-born photographer has collaborated with the Alamodome, the San Antonio River Walk, and the San Antonio Spurs. 

In 2017, one of Zeckua’s aerial pictures was selected to be printed in the world’s first book of aerial photography with drones: Dronescapes: The New Aerial Photography from Dronestagram. The following year one of his aerial images was on display at Le Salon de la Photo, the largest event of the European photography market, in Paris, France. 

In 2019, he collaborated with Forbes Magazine with aerial images of Mexico and, in 2021, he released his first aerial photography exhibition: San Antonio: Perspectives from the Sky. 

“What you see depends not only on what you look at, but where you are looking from,” he said in his artist statement from San Antonio: Perspectives from the Sky. “In the last six years that I have been taking pictures with a drone, my greatest inspiration has been to show images of ordinary elements from a different perspective, taking advantage of the freedom to raise the camera to unimaginable heights and place it at extraordinary angles. My work shows that, as in life, there is more than one way to look at things.” 

The Dee Howard Foundation and the UTSA Art Contest’s Mission to Mars is on display in the Level Zero corridor as a 16-piece display.

In 2020, the foundation in partnership with UTSA, launched the Dee Howard Foundation/UTSA Pre-K-12 Aviation and Aerospace Art Contest with the goal of challenging young people to depict their vision of a human mission to Mars. In its first year, the contest drew hundreds of students from across the San Antonio area.

On Oct. 24, the foundation launched its newest contest with the theme The Future is Bright. 

“For this year’s contest, we are asking young people to use their imaginations to create art that explores what flight might look like in the next 20 years,” said Christina Martinez, the foundation’s executive director. “We can’t wait to see what amazing pieces of art are inspired by this year’s theme.” 

In Terminal A’s upper level waiting area, art lovers will find Allee Wallace’s The MLK March, a collection of images from past justice-pursuing MLK marches. 

In 1987, the MLK, Jr. Commission and the City of San Antonio held its first official Martin Luther King, Jr. March. Each year, a variety of educational, inspirational, and celebratory events honor one of the nation’s most revered civil rights leaders. San Antonio now hosts the largest march in the nation and Wallace, who once studied under the late Ansel Adams, captures some of it in this show.

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In the Terminal A baggage claim area, the San Antonio International Airport is showcasing Essential Expressions, an art exhibit of their own. This display features art from SAT employees and their families: David Castro, Michele Hope, Syed Mehdi, Joseph Perno, Janis Vogt, Karen Wilson, and Paxson Amar. The show is intended to elevate the artistic expressions of essential workers and will be on display throughout the holiday travel season.

Located in both Terminal B by the TSA checkpoint and Terminal A just past the security checkpoint is Jason Myers’ From War to Words: A Visual Voices Portrait Series.

The exhibit is being presented by CreatiVets, an organizations dedicate to empowering wounded veterans to heal through the arts and music. The group has directly helped more than 850 veterans from 48 states through their art and musical programming.

Although Myers’ photographs have been featured in Sports Illustrated and Forbes, he describes his work with CreatiVets as “the most important and impactful. Collaborating with patriots who are finding new paths to heal through art and music is the most rewarding work of my career,” he said. 

Myers’ exhibit is scheduled to run through the end of March 2022. It will then move to another international airport to raise awareness and support for U.S. veterans. 

Learn more about the Arts, Music, and Culture Program of the San Antonio International Airport here. 

Jade Esteban Estrada is a staff writer for the San Antonio Sentinel, where he covers public health and other citywide issues. jade@sasentinel.com | Twitter: @satx_writer