I recently signed a contract with the New Mexico Museum of Art to officially begin work on my new fiber and found art project Gathered and Felt. I’ll be sharing this project as an installation at the Vladem Contemporary and workshop during winter 2026-27; it will be part of the Valdem Contemporary’s Window Box Project. I’m working on it already and will also be sharing more about the project here soon. In the meantime, the contract itself has me thinking back to the last time I participated in an art project that was connected to a public arts organization.
In 2012, my experimental documentary project, Art of the Bayou, was awarded a National Endowment for the Arts Art Works grant. This award should have marked the start of an era of celebration with this chance to bring an ambitious project to life. Instead, it launched one of the most challenging experiences of my career.
Since the ArtWorks grant is not awarded to individual artists I needed to work with a fiscal sponsor, so I approached the director of an arts organization that I’d worked with for around four years in various administrative capacities. Not only did this organization’s mission align with the mission of my project, but I also thought the director of the sponsoring non-profit organization was trustworthy and I considered them a friend. During the years that I was employed by this organization we shared professional successes and growth, along with personal stories and laughs. During the time of this incident she began sharing personal health concerns that now I suspect may not have been true at all, but ways to pull me in, to soften my boundaries, to emotionally manipulate me. Nevertheless I trusted the reassurances, laughter and promises. I wanted to believe them.
But trust unraveled. When I realized the truth… that this person had been lying to me and mishandling funds for my project’s grant as well as operational funds for the entire organization and project grants for regional grantees. When I finally put the pieces together in 2013 (after months of never receiving payments I was owed from the NEA award and hearing them state over and over again “The check’s in the mail…”) I called the NEA office and reported my suspicions. That act of truth-telling, satya in its rawest form, was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done. It meant facing the fact that my project could not continue, and that I would be the one left to carry the fallout.
The Weight of Betrayal
The NEA Inspector General later confirmed what I had already suspected: the organization failed to comply with financial standards, misused funds, and neglected reporting requirements (NEA Special Review, 2015). Around the same time, local news documented other artists and programs experiencing similar issues (Houma Times, 2013).
But the facts don’t erase the personal wound. What cut deepest was that someone I trusted, someone who presented themselves as a friend, chose deceit. For the past twelve years they have continued spinning half-truths, convincing others in the small South Louisiana arts community that the collapse was someone else’s fault. I know that isn’t true. I saw their manipulation firsthand.
What’s worse is that parts of the academic world I came from, faculty at my undergraduate school, believe/believed them. They never asked for my story. They sided with her, leaving me silenced and feeling like an outsider. And now, seeing this person affiliated with this small liberal arts college I feel uncomfortable, unsettled, like the wound hasn’t closed.
Seeking Closure
I never got an apology from the person who deceived me. Not for the manipulation, the lies, or the pressure they put on me to take on their role when they already knew the books were broken.
I did, however, receive apologies from others. Board members acknowledged the organizational failures. One even helped me reach a legal settlement for damages, confirming what I already knew in my heart: that I was not liable, that I was not responsible. Still, the absence of apology from the one who caused the harm lingers.
It leaves a residue of anger. Anger that I trusted. Anger that I was manipulated. Anger that I let someone’s words bend my sense of reality for too long.
Satya as Lifeline
Yoga teaches that satya (truth-telling) is essential. But truth is rarely clean or easy. For me, satya meant picking up the phone and reporting the lies. It meant naming what happened to my community, even when it cost me my project. It meant admitting to myself that someone I thought was a friend was, in fact, using me.
Satya didn’t save me from grief or bitterness. But it gave me ground to stand on when the lies threatened to undo me. Satya became the thread I clung to: the reminder that even if others spread falsehoods, I could choose to live aligned with truth.
Why I Am Telling This Now
It has been over a decade, and still there is no closure. The sadness flares into anger; the anger dissolves into disappointment. Some days I feel embarrassed for not speaking my truth sooner. Other days I feel strong for surviving it.
When I signed a contract with the New Mexico Museum of Art for an exhibition I’m in next year it got me thinking back to this last contract/ big project. So, perhaps that’s why I am writing about all of this now, years later. Truth-telling is not just about reporting what happened in the moment, it is about refusing to let lies become the lasting story.
For over a decade, I have watched someone continue to manipulate narratives, to convince others that what happened was someone else’s fault. My silence has been its own burden. Writing this now is an act of satya, to place the truth, my truth, into the open where it belongs.
I cannot rewrite what happened. But I can tell the truth of it: I was manipulated. I was lied to. My ambitious project turned into something painful. And yet, I also found resilience, community, and a clearer understanding of what integrity requires.
That is the scar of Art of the Bayou. And it is also the gift.
Takeaways for Other Artists
For any artist stepping into grant-funded work, especially with a fiscal sponsor, here are lessons my story makes clear:
- Trust, but verify. Contracts protect you, but sponsors must also be accountable. Ask for documentation regularly, and don’t rely only on verbal assurances.
- Choose fiscal sponsors carefully. Look for organizations with solid financial systems, transparency, and a track record of compliance. Don’t be afraid to ask hard questions.
- Know that your reputation is at stake. As the public face of the project, you may carry consequences for failures that are not your own. Prepare for this possibility.
- Keep your own records. Emails, receipts, reports, etc. This documentation is a form of satya, a paper trail that grounds you in truth.
- Rely on community. When institutions fail, community often steps up. Seek out allies who will support you, believe you, and help you keep going.
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