Constance Jaeggi, Angelina Sáenz and ire’ne lara silva
Escaramuza, the Poetics of Home
Jan 8 - 31 , 2026
In this sweeping and candid photographic portrait series, Escaramuza, the Poetics of Home, photographer Constance Jaeggi traces the connections between contemporary Mexican American women’s equestrian performance and historical female soldiers of the Mexican Revolution.
The national sport of Mexico, charrería, Mexican rodeo, romanticizes the horseman—el charro—as both gentleman and cowboy, and a hero of the revolution. Female competitors are escaramuza charra, based on soldaderas, women freedom fighters, and patterned after the legendary Adelita, Pancho Villa’s soldier-sweetheart, a beautiful maiden who took up arms to fight alongside him. Contemporary escaramuzas charras must navigate the mythology of the extreme feminine and reality of fearless horsemanship in the arena.
In the masculine world of charrería escaramuza charra is the singular exception. During an eight-hour charreada of men’s events, there will likely be only one ten-minute escaramuza performance. Escaramuzas participate as a team, riding sidesaddle in vivid, Victorian-era dresses, gracefully executing intricate choreography set to mariachi music. Their riding is a dazzling display somewhere between ballet and mounted cavalry maneuvers. Cruces y remolinos, el abanico, la punta—the art of escaramuza is their whirling and weaving, their knife-edge timing and precision amid a festival of color. The word escaramuza translates to “skirmish,” a reminder of the contentious space these women occupy: the demure beauty of señoritas and the boldness of warriors.
Artist Constance Jaeggi collaborates with award-winning Los Angeles poet Angelina Sáenz and Texas Poet Laureate ire’ne lara silva to offer a rare view into the world of escaramuza charra and the women behind the pageantry and costumes. Pairing intimate photographs of the escaramuzas with poetry and interviews, the exhibition provides a sensory feast for viewers that is lyrical and revealing. These collected images and stories create a constellation of women riders of all ages and sizes, from across the United States, giving viewers a glimpse of the real work behind the scenes, the camaraderie between teammates, the strength of family legacies, and a commitment to cultural heritage that is beyond borders.
Running throughout the exhibition is the stark agrarian landscape of cattle ranches and the lavish feminine trappings of the escaramuza, that curious mix of roughness and elegance at the root of this tradition.
The result is a compelling narrative, a story of women reimagining and reshaping the identity of the escaramuza charra, pushing boundaries to broaden a space for their artistry and the labor of love, showing the steel beneath the ribbons and lace.
— Dr. Marcela Fuentes, author and professor, Texas Christian University
In-Person Artist Talk
Sat, Jan 10, 2 PM
Constance Jaeggi (Swiss, b. 1990, she/her) is a Swiss photographic artist based in Fort Worth, TX and Denver, CO. Jaeggi’s work focuses on the relationship between horse and human, in particular women. She uses horses as a backdrop for exploring themes of intimacy and identity, connection, and power dynamics.
Her work has been internationally exhibited and published. Her most recent project, Escaramuza, the Poetics of Home is a 2024 Lensculture Critics’ Choice Awards winner. She has had two solo shows at the National Cowgirl Museum in Fort Worth, TX and has been exhibited internationally in Belfast, Ireland, Rome and Venice, Italy and Zurich, Switzerland, and has been published notably by National Geographic, CNN Style, Guardian and The Washington Post.
Angelina Sáenz (she/her) is a Los Angeles–based Chicana writer, poet, and award-winning educator. She is a UCLA Writing Project Fellow, an alumna of the VONA/Voices Workshop for Writers of Color, and a Macondo Writers Workshop Fellow. She is the author of the poetry collections Maestra (FlowerSong Press, 2024) and Edgecliff (FlowerSong Press, 2021), as well as the children’s book Waiting for Luna. Sáenz is a featured poet and contributor to Escaramuza, a collaborative poetry and photography coffee-table book exploring the poetics of home, published by GOST Books (2025). Her poetry has appeared in Diálogo, Split This Rock, Out of Anonymity, Angels Flight Literary West, Every Other, Cockpit Revue Paris, and The Acentos Review. She was featured in a Poetry Folio in Poetry Magazine, published by the Poetry Foundation (April 2025).
ire’ne lara silva (she/her), 2023 Texas State Poet Laureate, is the author of five poetry collections, furia, Blood Sugar Canto, CUICACALLI/House of Song, FirstPoems, and the eaters of flowers, which won Gold for the 2025 Juan Felipe Herrera Best Poetry Book (ILBA), a comic book, VENDAVAL, and two short story collections, flesh to bone, which won the Premio Aztlán, and the light of your body. ire’ne is the recipient of the ILBA 2025 Rising Stars Poetry Award, a 2025 Storyknife Writers Residency, the 2021 Texas Institute of Letters Shrake Award for Best Short Nonfiction, a 2021 Tasajillo Writers Grant, a 2017 NALAC Fund for the Arts Grant, the final Alfredo Cisneros del Moral Award (2014), and was the Fiction Finalist for AROHO’s 2013 Gift of Freedom Award.