Abigail Ramsbottom-Cuevas Panza

Biography

Abigail Ramsbottom came to the South Dakota Art Museum from Richmond, Virginia in the summer of 2022. She grew up between Florida and Virginia most of her life, but fell in love with the prairie during her first visit to South Dakota in 2021. She holds a B.A. in art history and Spanish from Stetson University (DeLand, Florida) and an M.A. in art history from Virginia Commonwealth University (Richmond). As a college freshman, Abigail got her first job in an art museum as a gallery assistant at the Hand Art Center. Her senior project involved curating as show from the Vera Bluemner Kouba Collection at the museum, which she titled (Un)canonical Bluemner. As a graduate student, Abigail researched contemporary carceral art, focusing on the work of three contemporary artists who've experienced incarceration.

During and in between her degrees, Abigail worked as an ESOL (English for Speakers of Other Languages) teacher's assistant for three years. Then, she became an ESOL teacher in 2017, working for La Casa Cultural Latina at Stetson University for five years. While serving as a language educator, Abigail experimented with various teaching methodologies, eventually bringing art and Visual Thinking Strategies into the classroom, which produced wondrous and exciting results. As her love of education grew, she was employed by the Hand Art Center in DeLand, FL to serve as the museum's coordinator while they conducted a nation-wide search for a director.

Abigail was enthusiastic at the chance to combine her interests in education and museums as the curator of education at the South Dakota Art Museum. Her education praxis is visitor-centered, and she sees community outreach and engagement as vital in her role. In her personal life, Abigail and her partner, Cristian, enjoy paddleboarding outside, taking their dog, Jesmain, swimming and playing too many board games.