At a Key Moment for her Family, the Selena Exhibit Brings Together Intimate Objects
The Exhibit displays a dress and instruments belonging to the late artist Selena Quintanilla. The temporary exhibition will remain available until March 16.
Outfits, awards, and intimate memories of Selena Quintanilla make up the new temporary exhibition dedicated to the queen of Tex-Mex at the Grammy Museum in Los Angeles, a show that, according to her sister Suzette, is deeply personal and takes on greater emotional weight for the family after the recent death of their father. “Everything (exposed) means something to me. When Selena passed away, everything took on a different meaning. I just lost my father, so every little thing I have or that I didn’t notice before, now catches my attention,” Suzette Quintanilla, who faced the loss of Abraham Quintanilla Jr. on December 13, This is the first time that personal items of the star, who died in 1995, have left the Selena Museum located in Corpus Christi, Texas.
According to the exhibition’s curator, Kelsey Goelz, the small exhibit titled ‘Selena From Texas to the World’ is “kind of a small version of the museum in Texas here.” The exhibition opened to the public this Thursday and will remain available until March 16. This includes iconic outfits such as the white ruffled blouse, black leather jacket and gold hoops she wore for the cover of the single ‘Amor Prohibido’, one of her most famous songs, as well as the white dress embroidered with silver beads with which she received the Grammy for best Mexican-American album in 1994, and which she would later wear in the video for the song ‘No me queda más’.
Other popular garments, such as her white bra and pants set that she wore at a concert in Houston’s Astrodome in 1994; and a similar red one that she wore at a concert in San Antonio the same year, adorn the room located on the fourth floor of the museum. Also included in the exhibition are the last microphone that heard her sing on stage with a white flower and stained with her characteristic red lipstick, or four decorative eggs from her collection of more than 500, among many other objects. “That simple goose egg over there was the first egg he ever bought, and he bought it right here in Los Angeles… So I thought it was appropriate for him to come here. That’s how the egg collection started,” Quintanilla said.
The Latino Icon that Resonates in Dark Times for the Community
The exhibition pays tribute to one of the most influential Mexican-American figures in music history and, although it was not conceived for that purpose, it is presented at a key moment for the Latino community in the United States, marked by the intense immigration policy promoted by the current president, Donald Trump. “We made the decision to share a little bit of Selena and ourselves here in Los Angeles, focusing more on her music and what it continues to mean to this day, but in a way, it also connects with what’s happening in the world.
Selena was very proud to be a Latina American, and I think we all should continue to be. No matter what happens in the world, that doesn’t change who we are,” noted the CEO of Q-Productions. ‘Selena From Texas to the World’ interacts with the rest of the museum, as there is a Michael Jackson exhibit to one side and the Grammy history section on the lower floors. “We took a little bit of everything, and it can also be seen within a broader musical context,” Goelz explains. The museum entrance is dominated by a mural by local artist Mister Toledo, which portrays some of the most emblematic moments of the singer’s career.
