From the Editor2026 New Mexico Field Guide
This edition of the New Mexico Field Guide is an invitation to take in a dynamic year of New Mexico arts programming—and then experience it in motion.
May 22, 2026
Feature2026 New Mexico Field GuideNew Mexico
Meow Wolf’s first interactive installation celebrates its tenth anniversary, marking an era of staggering growth and expansion, with even more to come.
May 22, 2026
Looking for a spiritual awakening this spring? Arts editor Natalie Hegert traces a visionary and esoteric throughline among thirty-seven of this season’s top exhibitions.
March 27, 2026
From the EditorVol. 13 The Road
Southwest Contemporary: The Road reconstitutes even the busiest Southwest arteries as byways that tether far-flung places and people.
March 20, 2026
The “largest art installation in the world” covers the land in Texas once shared by bison, Comanche, and their horses. As a memorial, it represents but does little to repair.
March 20, 2026
Inside Southwest ContemporarySouthwestThe Road
Our call for pitches for “The Road” was regurgitated back to us by AI writers around the world. We almost fell for one of them.
March 17, 2026
Cecilia Alemani rolled out an exhibition like no other in Santa Fe—its visionary weirdness will hit everyone a bit different.
November 20, 2025
From the EditorVol. 12 Obsession
Southwest Contemporary: OBSESSION foregrounds artistic fixations, revealing the loops, patterns, and intensities that define the Southwest’s cultural landscape.
September 08, 2025
Lisa Frank, headquartered in Tucson, Arizona, offers up a rainbow-bedazzled mirror to the emptiness of the American dream.
September 05, 2025
PhotographyTexasVol. 12 Obsession
Phoebe Shuman-Goodier’s photography marks her sculptural collaborations with her father, and a shared obsession with transforming a junkyard into art.
September 05, 2025
Don’t sit it out. These sixteen explosive exhibitions across the Southwest will keep the fire lit for your summer of resistance.
June 18, 2025
Travel2025 New Mexico Field Guide
The Spencer Theater, with its soaring form echoing the surrounding mountains, exemplifies Antoine Predock’s design philosophy.
May 23, 2025
Artist Jack Craft operates a cattle ranch in the Texas Panhandle while producing minimalist sculptures and experimental prints.
April 17, 2025
While the Roswell Museum’s doors remain closed following the disastrous flood last year, support comes from the local community and statewide arts organizations.
April 08, 2025
From the EditorVol. 11 The Hyperlocal
Discover how Southwest Contemporary: The Hyperlocal explores art that connects immediate environments to global concerns—from borderland communities to regional myths and climate concerns.
March 07, 2025
ArtistsTexasVol. 11 The Hyperlocal
Houston-based artist Cindee Klement depicts otherwise invisible systems and their interconnections to encourage local ecological recovery in the Energy Capital of the World.
March 07, 2025
ArtistsNew MexicoVol. 11 The Hyperlocal
Since the Hermits Peak/Calf Canyon Fires, Jess Lanham has been creating work about the stark changes in her hometown of Las Vegas, New Mexico, using fragments and wildfire ash.
March 07, 2025
Over 200 arts leaders descend on Austin's Capitol to dispense Texas charm—and return-on-investment pitches—for state funding at Texas Arts Advocacy Day.
February 20, 2025
Museum insiders offer firsthand accounts of the flash flood that breached Roswell Museum in October—and an update on the uphill battle for remediation.
December 19, 2024
Don’t miss these essential art exhibitions across the Southwest for fall 2024, featuring major surveys, immersive installations, and artistic dialogues.
October 02, 2024
When the Lubbock City Council defunded a popular art event for promoting the “LGBT Agenda,” confirming fears of repressive drag bans in Texas, the art community got fired up.
September 20, 2024
FeatureSouthwestVol. 10 Radical Futures
Science fiction authors have provided many visions of dystopian futures in the Southwest. Can architects help avert such disastrous outcomes?
September 06, 2024
Field Report2024 New Mexico Field GuideNew MexicoTravel
"Come for the aliens, stay for the art!" sums up the compelling reasons to visit Roswell, New Mexico—a mecca for UFO culture and contemporary art.
May 24, 2024
SITE Santa Fe Young CuratorsNew Mexico
Southwest Contemporary teamed up with SITE Santa Fe to produce a series of articles written by high school students taking part in their 2023-24 Young Curators program.
March 27, 2024
Belonging: Contemporary Native Ceramics from the Southern Plains brings together works by seven artists that range from ceramic vessels to monumental sculptures to installations that radiate outward in space.
March 19, 2024
ArtistsTexasVol. 9 Living Histories
Andrew Ina's multi-media artwork delves into diasporic memory and displacement, using his family's photographs documenting their lives in Lebanon and the United States.
March 01, 2024
ArtistsArizonaVol. 9 Living Histories
Medical doctor, photographer, and public artist Chip Thomas has taken a historical turn in his work, building on deep, place-based research and activating architecture with archival discoveries.
March 01, 2024
Tucson, Arizona is home to an incredible community of creative people. Southwest Contemporary visited in November 2023 to discover the local art scene.
February 16, 2024
In Interference Patterns at SITE Santa Fe, Nicholas Galanin (Lingít/Unangax̂) stokes rage and reckoning with the dark history and continuing legacies of settler-colonialism.
December 21, 2023
Seeking tips on artist-made gifts? Are you trying to find Southwest-inspired stocking stuffers? Want to shop locally and support area artists and artisans? Read the Southwest Contemporary Gift Guide 2023!
December 05, 2023
