Abad (Pacita) papers, 1946-2025
Collection context
Summary
- Title:
- Pacita Abad papers
- Dates:
- 1946-2025
- Extent:
- 53 Linear Feet (7 cartons, 86 manuscript boxes, 20 flat boxes, 2 card boxes, 1 map folder) and 59 gigabyte(s)
- Language:
- English .
- Preferred citation:
-
[identification of item], Pacita Abad papers (M3075). Department of Special Collections and University Archives, Stanford Libraries, Stanford, California.
Background
- Scope and content:
-
The Pacita Abad papers contains the working files of the artist, Pacita Abad, created during her lifetime, as well as some documents and publications from the Pacita Abad Art Estate's activities after her death. This includes material relating to exhibitions (including articles, photographs, and flyers); project documentation (including for the Alkaff Bridge); painting images; financial records and painting sales and donations; workshops, talks, and other professional activities; art residencies; personal and professional correspondence; catalogs; published material that used her art images; and artifacts.
The collection also holds born-digital and audiovisual material containing interviews, exhibition footage, documentaries, painting images, and other subjects.
- Biographical / historical:
-
Pacita Barsana Abad (1946-2004) was a Filipino-American artist known for her colorful, mixed-media trapunto works. She was born in Basco, Batanes, to Aurora and Jorge Abad and moved to Manila in 1952 at the beginning of her father's second term in Congress.
She received a BA in Political Science from the University of the Philippines Diliman, and left the country in 1970 as a result of her anti-government political activism during the Marcos period. She planned to go to Spain to finish her law degree, but ended up staying in the United States, where she obtained an MA in Asian history at Lone Mountain College. She briefly married painter George Kleiman, whom she credited with introducing her to the art world.
Abad then met and hitch-hiked across Asia from Istanbul to Manila with future husband Jack Garrity. On her return to San Francisco, Abad then decided to forego a full scholarship to UC Berkeley School of Law, and dedicate her life to painting. The first time she took painting classes was at the age of 30 in 1976, at the Corcoran School of Art, and soon staged her first exhibition of early paintings at her Washington, DC home and studio in 1977. The following year she took additional courses in drawing at The Art Students League in New York.
Abad's nomadic career then took her to a wide range of locations throughout the world, and she spent time painting in Washington, DC, New York, Boston, Khartoum, Sanaa, Dhaka, Bangkok, Manila, Jakarta, Singapore, Port Moresby, and Santo Domingo, among others. These travels gave her an appreciation of a multitude of traditional cultures and artistic styles, especially handwoven textiles, which she would often incorporate into her own artwork. With these influences Abad moved her artwork off the easel and she made her first trapunto painting, African Mephisto, in 1981. Abad's trapunto paintings soon became her signature style, incorporating objects such as shells, sequins, glass mirrors, and buttons sewn on to a quilted and painted canvas.
Living in the Philippines in 1984 she opened her first major solo show, 'Pacita Abad: A Philippine Painter Looks at the World'. That same year she became the first female recipient of the TOYM (Ten Outstanding Young Men) Award for Art in the Philippines.
Over her 32-year career, Abad created over 5,500 artworks, as she incessantly experimented with a wide range of materials including canvas, paper, bark cloth, metal, ceramics, glass and textiles. She was also constantly exhibiting her work in a variety of places around the world including museums, galleries, public spaces, and stores. In total, her artwork was shown in 298 venues in more than 35 countries around the world, of which 76 were solo exhibitions. Despite her demanding schedule she always made time to give numerous art workshops for children, students and Alzheimer's patients.
Near the end of her career Abad was one of the first artists selected for a residency at the Singapore Tyler Print Institute, where she created a series of prints called 'Circles In My Mind'.
While undergoing treatment for cancer during the last year of her life, as her gift to the people of Singapore, Abad then proceeded to paint the 55 meter Alkaff Bridge and covered it with 2,350 colorful circles.
During her last years, Abad built Fundacion Pacita on her native island of Batanes to be her studio home. After she died of cancer in 2004 it was gifted by the Pacita Abad Art Estate to the Jorge, Aurora and Pacita Abad Memorial Foundation. Fundacion Pacita is now a homage to Abad and operated as a nature lodge and art center managed by her siblings.
Abad became a US citizen in 1994, and held dual Philippine - American citizenship.
-- Source: Pacita Abad Art Estate
- Acquisition information:
- Gift of the Pacita Abad Art Estate, 2025.
- Physical location:
- Special Collections and University Archives materials are stored offsite and must be paged three business days in advance. For more information on paging collections, see the department's website: https://library.stanford.edu/libraries/special-collections.
- Rules or conventions:
- Describing Archives: A Content Standard
Indexed terms
About this collection guide
- Date Encoded:
- This finding aid was produced using ArchivesSpace on 2026-04-20 11:15:11 -0700 .
Access and use
- Restrictions:
-
Collection is open for research use except for Box 104 in Series 10. Material must be paged at least 3 business days in advance of intended use.
Audiovisual materials are not available in original format, and must be reformatted to a digital use copy. Born-digital materials are closed until processed.
- Terms of access:
-
While Special Collections is the owner of the physical and digital items, permission to examine collection materials is not an authorization to publish. These materials are made available for use in research, teaching, and private study. Any transmission or reproduction beyond that allowed by fair use requires permission from the owners of rights, heir(s) or assigns.
- Preferred citation:
-
[identification of item], Pacita Abad papers (M3075). Department of Special Collections and University Archives, Stanford Libraries, Stanford, California.
- Location of this collection:
-
Department of Special Collections, Green Library557 Escondido MallStanford, CA 94305-6004, US
- Contact:
- (650) 725-1022