The Thacher Gallery at the University of San Francisco Presents ‘Women’s Work is Never Done’ - Works by Yolanda M. Lopez
SAN FRANCISCO, CA (August 9, 2023) – The Thacher Gallery at the University of San Francisco (USF) presents rarely seen work by iconic Bay Area artist, activist, and mentor Yolanda M. López: ‘Women’s Work is Never Done’ from August 31 to November 12, 2023.
An opening celebration with the collection’s curators - Angelica Rodriguez, Lopez’s archivist, and Rio Yanez, her son - will take place on Thursday, August 31 from 5:00-7:00 p.m. in the Thacher Gallery.
This exhibition of rediscovered drawings, collages, paintings, photographs, prints, and process pieces by Yolanda M. López (1942-2021) charts the evolution of her creative projects over six decades from the 1960s to the 2010s.
This body of work reveals López’s inquisitive approach to artistic mediums and the feminist and political sensibilities that emerged in her practice from life experiences, research, and community activism. Artworks include drawings from her youth, protest designs, preparatory studies for her iconic 1978 Guadalupe series, photography, collage, and xerox art from 1980-90s Mission, prints from her “Women’s Work is Never Done” series, as well as her final reflective works.
Through the decades, López portrayed the multifaceted roles that Latinx and BIPOC women hold in society, depicting working class women whose labor and contributions are too often undervalued and underrepresented. This was not only a creative choice, but informed by lived experience for López, who even at the height of her career, made ends meet by working at the Macy’s gift wrapping counter in downtown San Francisco. Returning the viewer’s gaze, her subjects question cultural and gender stereotypes while retaining their strength and humanity.
About the Thacher Gallery at the University of San Francisco
The Thacher Gallery is a public art gallery in the USF Gleeson Library where creativity, scholarship, and community converge. The gallery is free and open to the public daily from 12:00 - 6:00 p.m.
About the University of San Francisco
The University of San Francisco is a private, Jesuit Catholic university that reflects the diversity, optimism, and opportunities of the city that surrounds it. USF offers more than 230 undergraduate, graduate, professional, and certificate programs in the arts and sciences, business, law, education, and nursing and health professions. At USF, each course is an intimate learning community in which top professors encourage students to turn learning into positive action, so the students graduate equipped to do well in the world — and inspired to change it for the better. For more information, visit usfca.edu.
