Catch up on some of the top art news headlines in the southwest region over the last month, including acquisitions, people on the move, grants, and more.
News
The Dallas Art Fair officially canceled its 2020 edition a result of pandemic-related restrictions.
The fair organizers set off a wave of concerns when it said it would not issue exhibiting galleries refunds for already-paid booth fees. Instead, the fair would offer credits to exhibitors at future fairs. Thirty-four galleries who were going to show at the 2020 fair have sent a letter to its organizers demanding that the fair distribute refunds.
Gerald Peters Contemporary announced exclusive worldwide representation of Santa Fe artist Tom Joyce.
The announcement was occasioned by the completion of Joyce’s commission Berg XX. The 101,400-pound sculpture joins the prestigious collection of patron and Cleveland Art Museum trustee Scott Mueller.
Joyce is one of the most accomplished American sculptors working today. In the nearly two decades since his MacArthur Fellowship, Joyce has created largescale works engaged with process and materiality, underpinned by an abiding interest in the physical properties of his chosen medium: iron. Joyce’s work, at once subtle and bold, ancient and modern, pays homage to the rich heritage of blacksmithing even while extending that legacy.
Read a Studio Visit interview with Tom Joyce, published by Southwest Contemporary August 2017, here.
The Jordan Schnitzer Family Foundation announced the acquisition of a major print archive by Judy Chicago.
One of the most extraordinary aspects of the Jordan Schnitzer Family Foundation’s acquisition of the Judy Chicago print archive is the Foundation’s generous museum exhibition and lending program. The Foundation will photograph, document, frame, and conserve the archive, and make it available to scholars, curators, and audiences worldwide, without charging exhibition fees.
Grants and Awards
The National Hispanic Cultural Center in Albuquerque received a $100,000 grant from the W.K. Kellogg Foundation to bolster programming on racial disparities.
The grant will bolster a variety of narrative-change projects aimed at facilitating dialogue and cross-cultural education as well as examining the role of institutions themselves in the work of social change during the pandemic.
Mira, Mira On the Wall: Reflecting on 20 Years of Exhibitions, tentatively scheduled to open as a virtual exhibit in October 2020 when the NHCC celebrates its 20th anniversary, will be the first exhibit at NHCC funded by this grant. The exhibit is an institutional retrospective recounting the significant exhibitions that have been presented during the past two decades. It is an opportunity to review the work the museum has been a part of, to lift up important voices and stories again, and to examine what this work might look like in the future.
The Wheelwright museum was awarded an Institute of Museums and Library Services Inspire! Grant
The Wheelwright was awarded over $36,000 to improve protection, maintain sustainable preservation, and access to its collection of jewelry, metalwork, carvings, basketry, folk art, and textiles of Navajo, Rio Grande Pueblos, and other Native peoples of New Mexico.
Inspire! Grants for Small Museums is a special initiative designed to reduce the application burden on small museums and help them address priorities identified in their strategic plan.
Leadership Changes and Appointments
Santa Fe Art Auction has named Joshua Rose as its new Senior Vice President.
Rose will assist the 30-year old auction house in Western Art and Fine Art as well as helping with the development of new departments, including Native American Art and Photography. Rose spent the last fifteen years with International Artist Publishing where he served as the editor for American Art Collector, Western Art Collector, American Fine Art, and Native American Art magazines.
IAIA Academic Dean and noted artist, educator, and activist, Charlene Teters (Spokane), has announced her retirement, effective September 30, 2020.
Teters has been at IAIA since 1992 in various roles, most recently as Academic Dean since 2015.
As an artist, Teters has a history of producing politically-impactful installations. During the 1999 SITE Santa Fe biennial Looking for a Place (curated by Rosa Martinez), US artists from around the country were invited to participate with works focusing on place. Teters had observed that obelisk at the Santa Fe Plaza, which was partially inscribed with the term “savage Indians,” had been “modified” when someone chiseled away the word “savage.” Teters created her own obelisk which only contained the word “savage,” and placed it near the Plaza. She maintains that it was not created to be confrontational—merely to spur discussion on the topic, which we are currently revisiting vividly in our present moment.
Teters plans to return to her home reservation in Washington State to “create a place to make art in my homeland so I can become a part of the revitalization of my Spokane language and river culture.”
