Jodie Herrera's Hope is among the works featured in Keep Contemporary's new exhibit, Jodie Herrera: Pieces of Us. Photograph courtesy of Keep Contemporary.
Meet artist Jodie Herrera.
Artist Jodie Herrera focuses her work on the resilience of women. Depicting her subjects alongside ephemera and symbols that illustrate their narratives of pain, abuse, loss, and addiction, Herrera’s photo-realistic paintings celebrate their enduring power to overcome. Herrera’s work has been exhibited institutions like the Denver History Museum and in galleries from Los Angeles to Taos. She’s been featured in the Smithsonian’s Archive of American Art Experience, and you can see a selection of her works in Jodie Herrera: Pieces of Us, a solo exhibit at Keep Contemporary, in Santa Fe, opening Friday, 5–8 p.m.
“I’ve always loved the art Jared [Antonio Justo Trujillo, the owner of Keep Contemporary] showcases, and it’s great to exhibit alongside those works,” Herrera says. “It’s also such an interesting time of transition, and I am happy to be able to provide a safe and fun event for people to enjoy.”
Infinite Green is one of the public art pieces included in Urban Ecologies installed in the Santa Fe Railyard Park. Courtesy of the Railyard Art Committee.
Discover art in the park.
Hunt for wee ceramic toadstools, learn about local plant life, and consider our need for green spaces with Urban Ecologies, an eco-art installation that opens the family-friendly ArtPark21 celebration at the Santa Fe Railyard on Saturday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. “A lot of the installations are interactive,” says Chelsea Weathers, a volunteer for the Railyard Art Committee, which created the exhibit in partnership with ArtPark21 and John Davis. “We like to emphasize that it is really kid-friendly.”
Bio-artist Richard Lowenberg is installing ceramic shrooms throughout the park to prepare for the opening. “They have little messages inside them,” Weathers says. “It’s his take on a gift economy, that people will find these, take them, and keep them.” Can’t make the opening? The exhibit is on view through September 22.
The Taos Spring Art Walk is highlighted by art displayed on the town's museums, galleries and downtown buildings. Photograph courtesy of Paseo Projects.
See art on adobe.
Ken Price’s image of a classic movie drive-in covers the front of a defunct, adobe theater on the Taos plaza. It’s part of the Taos Spring Art Walk, an event created by Paseo Projects that uses light to display works from Taos museums and galleries on downtown buildings. Happening this Friday and Saturday from sunset to 10 p.m., the art walk anchors a week of activities that include virtual lectures, poetry readings, films, and performances—all available on the group’s website.
“It has been so much fun to use this as an opportunity to tell stories about the art and about the community,” says J. Matthew Thomas, executive director of Paseo Projects. “It sometimes reveals a new history or discovery in town.” The works are spaced throughout the plaza, with docents talking about them. Attendance is free.
Have a picnic in the park.
Continue this week’s Earth Day celebrations by spending some time outdoors when the temperatures in southern New Mexico will feel like summer. Mesilla Valley Bosque State Park, located about a mile west of Las Cruces, offers self-guided nature trails where you can see local wildlife, spot birds, and enjoy the aquatic ecosystem running along the Río Grande. Download a trail map, bring a picnic, and find the ideal spot to sit and enjoy the earth as it blossoms.
Martina Rosetta offers lessons on the art of horno cooking. Photograph courtesy of El Camino Real Trade Fair.
Learn a traditional way to bake.
Bake bread with Martina Rosetta (Santo Domingo Pueblo) during a virtual cooking demonstration on Friday at 6:30 p.m. via El Camino Real Trade Fair’s Facebook page, or its county webpage. Rosetta will explore the history, construction, and practice of baking in a traditional horno (an adobe beehive-shape oven) during the 15-minute video, plus demonstrate a simple bread recipe, how to prepare the horno, and what temperatures are ideal for cooking in it.
“There’s quite an interesting history with horno ovens,” says Aaron Gardner, site manager at the Albuquerque Museum’s Casa San Ysidro, which created the cooking video in collaboration with the El Camino Real Trade Fair. “It was originally a Moorish influence on the Spanish, and the Spanish brought it to the pueblos, so there is a long history from Africa, along the Iberian Peninsula, and then all the way to New Mexico.”