0.7 William camfield, b. 1934

The spring of ’64

Ginny and I came to Houston to work at the University of St. Thomas over the winter of 1963-64. I began teaching at St. Thomas that spring semester of 1964. I came here expressly because I had grown up in Texas—a native Texan—and decided I’d like to come back for a few years. While [I was] working as a graduate student at Yale, Jerry MacAgy had come through, and the director of graduate studies there knew I was interested in maybe moving back to Texas and said, “Hey, why don’t you meet this woman?” We met literally under a vitrine or table in the Yale Art Gallery. Jerry was on her hands and knees when I found her, trying to see how they had constructed this vitrine. I say, “Hey, this is someone a little different,” and so it turned out that the most interesting job in Texas at the time—bar none—was at the University of St. Thomas. So we met the de Menils and others and Ginny and I decided to come here. And as you know, Jerry, who was a diabetic, had a seizure and died six weeks after we got here. So we sort of entered Houston by fire in a way, but Dominique [de Menil]and I picked up the department.

I think the de Menils were committed to the city, and because they had come to a splitting point with the CAA, they wanted to continue that commitment with the city in some way, and the University of St. Thomas offered a possibility for that in Jerry MacAgy. They wanted to keep Jerry MacAgy. She had brought so much to the city and to them as individuals. And again, St. Thomas was a place where that could happen. I don’t know what all they meant to do. I know they wanted to continue having stimulating exhibitions; I know that they wanted to continue to foster a knowledge of and a love of the arts in the city. Whether or not they intended to have an academic program, I don’t know, but Jerry MacAgy was teaching courses in the history of art as well as organizing these stimulating exhibitions, and she decided, “I can’t do it all. I need a real art historian here so I can spend more time doing exhibits.” And that is how we got together. After Jerry’s death, both Dominique de Menil and I said, “We need help—both of us need help.” So Dominique went out for some help, and I went out for some help.

I’m trying to comment on what was most memorable and most important about Jermayne MacAgy, and of course I only knew her a short time. I first mentioned her genius for conceiving and executing exhibitions, but then I moved back and said, no—that is more of a vehicle. I think what was most essential about Jerry was her ability to excite people about the arts. And her genius again for conceiving and executing exhibitions was perhaps the most important way she did that. But she was a teacher, a pied piper, in all kinds of ways. [She was] more concerned with the exhibits, and that is why I became involved. She was looking for someone to do the art history; that was not her cup of tea. She did it—she excited people—but she really was not an art historian, and she wanted some help there. That is how I came to be in the picture. I was more an art historian but interested in exhibitions, and it looked like we could work together.