Chris Wilson, cultural landscape professor in the University of New Mexico School of Architecture and Planning, presents, “The Exalting Eye: Photography and the Myth of Santa Fe,” on Friday, Oct. 23, at 6 p.m. in the New Mexico History Museum Auditorium, at 113 Lincoln Ave. The event is free and open to the public.
Wilson's lecture marks the final event in support of Through the Lens: Creating Santa Fe, a photographic exhibit at the Palace of the Governors; the exhibit closes on Sunday, Oct. 25. During its nearly year-long display, the exhibit, lecture series and accompanying book (Museum of New Mexico Press, 2009) have drawn a steady stream of interest.
The book features essays and the work of more than 100 photographers, including Ansel Adams, Edward Weston, Laura Gilpin, Paul Strand, Lee Friedlander and Paul Caponigro. Since its release, it has been the third highest-selling book in the Museum of New Mexico shops. For more information on the book visit: The Exalting Eye: Photography and the Myth of Santa Fe.
The final speaker in the lecture series is Chris Wilson, J.B. Jackson Professor of Cultural Landscape Studies and author of the 1997 book, The Myth of Santa Fe: Creating a Modern Regional Tradition. The book followed the wave of 1980s publicity that projected Santa Fe as an exotic tourist destination. Wilson went behind the romance of adobe facades and turquoise marketing to tell another story: How the city’s alluring image was consciously created earlier in the 20thcentury, primarily by Anglo-American newcomers.
Looked at one way, Santa Fe's is a story of survival, of a 1912 city not yet accustomed to being a style unto itself that was transformed into an international hot spot. Looked at another way, that story carries a cautionary tale about the marketing of Native American and Hispanic cultures, and the social displacement and ethnic animosities that can accompany a tourist boom.
Wilson's book won the 1997 Gaspar Perez de Villegrá Award from the Historical Society of New Mexico and the 1999 Abbott Lowell Cummings Prize from the Vernacular Architecture Forum.
Santa Fe's transformation over time is likewise recounted in Through the Lens, which collects 160 years of photographic work in the city by many of the most recognized names in photography. They were among those who helped create the mystique that Wilson will discuss in his lecture. The exhibit was co-curated by photographer and educator Krista Elrick and Palace of the Governor Curator of Photography Mary Anne Redding.
The exhibition, lecture series, and publication of the book, Through the Lens: Creating Santa Fe, are sponsored by the Scanlan Family Foundation, Verve Gallery of Photography, New Mexico Council on Photography, New Mexico Humanities Council, Visual Arts Gallery at the Santa Fe Community College, Photography Department/Marion Center for Photographic Arts at the College of Santa Fe, Scheinbaum & Russek LTD., Santa Fe 400th Anniversary Partnership, Santa Fe Art Foundation, Andrew Smith Gallery, Museum of New Mexico Foundation, Palace Guard, Phyllis and Edward Gladden Endowment Fund, and the Women's Board of the Museum of New Mexico.
For information on the exhibition, contact Mary Anne Redding at (505) 476-5026.
Media Contact: Carolyn Gonzales, (505) 277-5920; e-mail: cgonzal@unm.edu
Posted by scarr at October 7, 2009 02:57 PM