Pillar: No More Mud in Our Eyes
Andrés Mario de Varona remembers and honors the life of Aaron Martin Garcia, also known as Pillar, and reveals the powerful human condition of strangers becoming friends, brothers, and teachers.
January 17, 2024
Antoinette Cauley: I Do It for The Hood, Pt. 2 at Modified Arts
Antoinette Cauley creates expressive portraiture to bridge hyperlocal and global concerns in I Do It For The Hood, Pt. 2 in Phoenix.
January 16, 2024
How Beatrice Moore and Tony Zahn Unintentionally Founded the Grand Avenue Arts District
Artists and preservationists Beatrice Moore and Tony Zahn recall how they established Phoenix’s Grand Avenue arts district despite wanting to do the opposite.
January 12, 2024
Elaine Parks and the Art of Paying Attention to Everything
Ceramicist Elaine Parks, in the under-appreciated northern Nevada landscape, carefully combs the environment to find and fashion objects that command awareness and attention.
January 10, 2024
Work in Progress with John Flores
Ceramicist John Flores infuses natural forms with humanistic qualities to create surreal sculptures that celebrate transition and change.
January 08, 2024
Southwest Art News: January 2024
Catch up on recent art news headlines in the Southwest region, including people on the move, grants, and more.
January 05, 2024
Books + LiteraryInside Southwest Contemporary
Our Favorite Reads (and One Podcast) of 2023
Southwest Contemporary’s staff—Roman Aragón, Natalie Hegert, Steve Jansen, and Lauren Tresp—pick their favorite reading materials of 2023.
January 04, 2024
High Desert Soundings Showcases the Nooks, Crannies, Slipstreams, and Eddies of Sound Art and Experimental Music
High Desert Soundings, a far-flung festival of experimental music and sound art, points our attention towards small sounds and unique resonances in the California desert.
December 22, 2023
Del Harrow Stays True to Form, Fusing Clay and Computer
Del Harrow, a Colorado-based ceramicist, combines ancient practices and contemporary technologies to create historically informed objects that tell stories toward a more sustainable future.
December 18, 2023
Ronald Rael Constructs an Architecture of the Borderlands with 3D-Printed Adobe and Regional Histories
Ronald Rael, who was born and raised in the San Luis Valley, harnesses the inherent contradictions between heritage and digital-build practices in his 3D-printed adobe works.
December 15, 2023
EssayCollectivity + CollaborationSouthwest
Hyperlink’s Creative Rollercoaster Embraces the Whirlwind of Interconnected Artistry
Hyperlink, a nebulous artist collective with projects in Denver, Chicago, and at a uranium mine ghost town in Wyoming, is a proven testament to the power of collectivity and collaboration.
December 13, 2023
“I’m Here, We’re Here”: The Work of Manuel Carrillo in Conversation with Delilah Montoya and Maryssa Rose Chavez
Though focused on a 20th-century photographer, Manuel Carrillo: Mexican Modernist illuminates a sense of community identity through beauty that connects to the work of artists practicing in the Southwest today.
December 11, 2023
Appropriation in the Arts Series Dissects Thievery of Indigenous Art and Culture
The Appropriation in the Arts series of panel discussions at the Museum of Northern Arizona and Sedona Arts Center tackles topics ranging from mass-produced costume Navajo jewelry to spiritual colonialism.
December 08, 2023
The Crestone Ziggurat: An Idiosyncratic Monument Among an Epic Landscape
Crestone Ziggurat, once a private sanctuary for meditation, is a peculiar monument nestled along the edge of the San Luis Valley and the Sangre de Cristo Mountains in southeast Colorado.
December 06, 2023
Lloyd Kiva New Documentary Highlights the Late Designer’s Influence on Indigenous Fashion and Southwest Culture
The story of artist, fashion designer, and Institute of American Indian Arts co-founder Lloyd Kiva New is brought to life in a new documentary by Indigenous filmmaker Nathaniel Fuentes.
December 04, 2023
Southwest Arts News: December 2023
Catch up on recent art news headlines in the Southwest region, including people on the move, grants, and more.
December 01, 2023
Truce Is a Word Made of Velvet: Andrea Gibson Named Colorado Poet Laureate
Celebrated Boulder-based performer Andrea Gibson, known for their spoken word poetry on topics ranging from gun reform to mental health, succeeds Bobby LeFebre as the tenth poet laureate of Colorado.
November 28, 2023
Southwest Cities Win Millions of Dollars from 2023 Bloomberg Public Art Challenge Awards
Bloomberg Public Art Challenge funding will help Phoenix and Salt Lake City address climate change, and Houston examine homelessness, through temporary public art that engages artists and community members.
November 21, 2023
Cey Adams, Album Cover Designer of Iconic Public Enemy Record, Receives the Retrospective Treatment in North Texas
The first Cey Adams retrospective displays more than four decades of the artist’s commercial collaborations with global brands and hip-hop visuals that include Public Enemy and Beastie Boys album covers.
November 20, 2023
Albuquerque Exhibition One Day Closer to Home to Showcase Projects by Incarcerated Youth
Amanda Dannáe Romero and sheri crider discuss the Sanitary Tortilla Factory exhibition featuring the work of system-impacted youth and the role of art in creating social change in New Mexico.
November 15, 2023
Work in Progress with Stephanie Leitch
Salt Lake City-based Stephanie Leitch, known for her labor-intensive and mesmerizing installations, continues honing her craft in recent exhibitions that comment on life’s murky truths.
November 13, 2023
Recent Allegations at Regional Art Spaces Beg the Question: Can Best Practices Prevent Censorship?
As Southwest art spaces such as Mesa Contemporary Arts Museum deal with art censorship allegations, national art censorship and art law experts weigh in on the broader issue.
November 10, 2023
Nani Chacon, Hand and Machine, and Working Classroom PAHTIA Mural Collaboration Celebrates Healing, Empowers Education
Nani Chacon, Hand and Machine, and Working Classroom student artists collaborated to create PAHTIA, an interactive, site-specific space for healing via art and technology at Albuquerque’s National Hispanic Cultural Center.
November 08, 2023
Exhibition by Ben Aleck Honors the Great Basin and Celebrates Native Resistance
Ben Aleck's exhibition at the Nevada Museum of Art looks at thirty years of work by the artist and Pyramid Lake Paiute Tribe member who has witnessed key Native American political moments.
November 06, 2023
Southwest Art News: November 2023
Catch up on recent art news headlines in the Southwest region, including people on the move, grants, and more.
November 02, 2023
Moab Officials Reject Message of Equality in Mural by Black Artist Chip Thomas
Grand County, Utah commissioners censored a quote by a historic Black cowboy about racial and class equality in a mural proposed by artist Chip Thomas.
October 31, 2023
Work in Progress with George Alexander
Santa Fe-based George Alexander (Muscogee-Creek) explores contemporary Indigenous culture with imagery that challenges the boundaries of what is considered “Native art.”
October 27, 2023
Jenn Shapland, Author of New Book Thin Skin, on Writing (and Not Writing, Sometimes)
Santa Fe-based Jenn Shapland, author of multi-award-winning My Autobiography of Carson McCullers, chats about the writing life and her new collection of essays, Thin Skin.
October 25, 2023
Janna Ireland’s Spectral Photographs of Nevada Architecture Explore Paul R. Williams’s Expansive Footing in the Silver State
Paul R. Williams, the first Black architect to be licensed to work in the Western United States, is the subject of a multi-venue exhibition of photographs by artist Janna Ireland.
October 23, 2023
Work in Progress with Robert King
Galisteo-based potter Robert King (Choctaw) discusses his collaboration and experimentation with clay in New Mexico’s high desert landscape.
October 20, 2023
