Opening Receptions

Carved & Cast: 20^th Century New Mexican Sculpture

Carved & Cast presents a survey of traditional sculptural media, genres, and styles that New Mexican artists have utilized over the last century and highlights the various ways sculpture engages with the cultural, social, and aesthetic issues unique to the Southwest. Though this exhibition serves as a broad, yet modest, survey of 20th century sculpture in the region, it also spotlights significant sculptors who are well represented in the collection. The work of Patrocinio Barela, Agnes C. Sims, Eugenie Shonnard, Fritz Scholder, and George Winslow Blodgett is highlighted in the alcoves while the rest of the gallery explores significant themes in 20th century sculpture such as portrait busts, animals, abstraction and modern takes on traditional themes.

Wait Until Dark

Wait Until Dark draws from the museum’s collection of painting, prints, and photographs to examine how nocturnes work within the broader category of painting. Generally understood as simply a night scene, the term nocturne refers to the quality of light in a painting, and can be twilight, waxing or waning light, or the darkness of night. Nocturne speaks as much to the mood of a painting as it does the quality of light. Artists use this to create narratives and set the scene for cultural and community events. These works illustrate how darkness conveys a mood that can be dreamy, ethereal, menacing, meditative, brooding, or poetic.

Shots in the Dark

Photography is most often associated with light (the word itself means “light writing” in Greek). Shifting our expectations about the medium of light is this selection of images by four contemporary Southwest photographers — Christopher Colville, Scott B. Davis, Michael Lundgren, and Ken Rosenthal — all working in the landscape at night. Each has a different perception of that special time between dusk and dawn, evoking fears, fantasies, and a sense of wonder.