Collecting in the 20th Century—and Beyond New Exhibitions Presage Vladem Opening
Friends of Contemporary Art + Photography Celebrating Contemporary Art and Imagery Friends of Contemporary Art + Photography is the member support group for the New Mexico Museum of Art and and the soon-to-open Vladem Contemporary. Members advocate for contemporary art and photography and enjoy exclusive educational and cultural events. Their support generates essential funding for museum exhibitions and collections. Annual dues are $100 for an individual and $150 for two people. A Museum of New Mexico Foundation membership is required to join. To join or learn more: Call 505.982.6366 ext. 100 or visit museumfoundation.org/FOCAP
Amid the first blush of a year that will see the August opening of the Vladem Contemporary in Santa Fe’s Railyard Arts District, the New Mexico Museum of Art is launching a series of exhibitions at its original location. These shows celebrate more than 100 years of the museum’s historic collections and look ahead to the cutting-edge works to be featured at the Vladem. Visitors will experience a permanent shift in focus in the Art Museum’s second-floor galleries. There, Selections From the 20th Century Collection brings together “classic treasures and new surprises from the museum’s collection of 20th century art,” says Merry Scully, the museum’s head of curatorial affairs and curator of contemporary art. From the Taos Society of Artists to members of the Santa Fe art colony and prominent modernists, these installations, on view through December 31, will change periodically to reflect the best of the collections. Ansel Adams: Pure Photography, on display through May 22, highlights 17 prints from the museum’s collections and two promised gifts, focusing on pre-1932 photographs Adams made before he was an internationally known artist. Organized by photography curator Katherine Ware, the exhibition shows Adams’s stylistic shift from pictorialism to his more recognizable modernist flourishes. Opening March 12 is Western Eyes: 20th Century Art Here and Now, exploring regional developments in Modernism, including Indigenous and Mexican movements, as well as American Realism and Native American art.
Ansel Adams, Church at Ranchos de Taos, ca. 1929-30. Gelatin silver print. Collection of the New Mexico Museum of Art. © The Ansel Adams Publishing Rights Trust.
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