Santa Fe Arts Journal

You can count on Joshua Habermann, the artistic director of the Santa Fe Desert Chorale, to program a variety of fascinating choral works for the vocal ensemble’s annual summer season of performances.

This summer’s repertoire is no exception. Habermann reaches back in time to the 1600s and travels to the 20th century during concerts that take place from July 21 through August 9. The 36th Summer Festival Season features three different programs.

“Sure on this Shining Night” includes choral works by Jake Runestad, Henk Badings and Johannes Brahms that evoke the beauty of the natural world. “In New Mexico, we are fortunate to live in a place of extraordinary beauty,” says Habermann in his program notes. [Read More…]

The autistic mind of a 15-year old boy named Christopher is explored in the play “The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time,” which premiered in London in 2012 and is presented by the Santa Fe Playhouse from July 19 through August 5.

Written by Simon Stephens and based on a novel of the same name by Mark Haddon, “The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time” is about how Christopher, a mathematical genius who fancies himself to be an amateur detective, solves the mystery of the death of his neighbor’s dog, which was killed with a garden fork.

He relentlessly searches for the dog’s murderer, even after his father objects. 

“We bring Christopher’s imagination to life in the play,” explains director Patrick MacDonald. [Read More…]

The rollercoaster ride of artistic success and failure is the subject of the play “The Sweetest Swing in Baseball,” which opens at Studio Center on July 14.

Suffering from a slump in her career after a disastrous gallery showing and a slump in her personal life, artist Dana Fielding, the lead character in the play, experiences paranoia and depression that sends her boyfriend packing. 

After a suicide attempt, Fielding lands in a mental ward where she begins to enjoy her structured days. When she’s told that her health insurance won’t pay for more than a 10-day stay, she devises a scheme with two fellow patients to fool the doctors into believing she’s psychotic by taking on the personality of baseball star Darryl Strawberry, who was known to have a sweet swing in baseball.

“Debrianna (Mansini) wanted to do the play, so I read it,” explains director Janet Davidson. [Read More…]

When documentary filmmaker Karen Cantor came to Santa Fe as an artist-in-residence at the Santa Fe Art Institute in 2010, it marked a turning point in her life and career. Inspired by the tremendous amount of creativity around her, Cantor decided to put together “Invitation to the Muse,” her third documentary and one that addresses the creative process. She interviewed artists about what they were doing and why they were doing it.

Cantor spent months in Santa Fe, connecting with members of the arts community and making many friends. She moved to town in 2012. 

“Native American issues kept coming up the longer I was in Santa Fe,’ Cantor says. “I decided to focus my attention on making a documentary film about Native American foods, health and empowerment.”

“Return,” Cantor’s 28-minute film about six contemporary Native American women and their efforts to reclaim health and spirit through traditional ways,  receives its premiere screening on July 13 at The Lodge in Santa Fe. [Read More…]

The New York-based ensemble Pilobolus recreates the feeling of being outdoors in its 2017 work “Branches,” which is included in the dance company’s program presented by Aspen Santa Fe Ballet at the Lensic Performing Arts Center on July 24.

“The piece is a dialogue about and with nature,” explains Pilobolus’s co-artistic director Matt Kent, who choreographed the work with the company’s other co-artistic director, Renée Jaworski. “Renée and I took seven dancers out for a long hike in our area to feel the wind on their faces and do what really became a walking meditation. We wanted our dancers to experience the outdoors before the creation of movements that communicate the feeling of nature.”

“Branches” was commissioned by Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival in 2017 and premiered at the festival last summer. [Read More…]

Alyssia Lazin, a fine art photographer who earned a master’s degree at Yale University and ran her firm Lazin & Katalan Design Studio in New York City for 25 years, has been collaborating with her husband Pavel Kapic, a painter who was born and raised in Czechoslovakia and studied management and applied science at the Czech Polytechnic University in Prague, on a new body of work titled “Confluence.”

Their combined efforts have resulted in photographs taken by Lazin and printed on canvas on which Kapic has painted abstract images. A show of their collaborative work is presented from July 6 through August 3 by Globe Fine Art and Edition ONE Gallery and displayed at Globe’s Canyon Road gallery space.

“The work on display is about abstraction and flow, which fits perfectly into Globe Fine Art’s program of presenting art about abstraction, color and light,” says Lazin. “As an art photographer, I am searching to transform the ordinary into an extraordinary visual experience. In seeing the poetry in everyday life, my painterly approach has been influenced by abstract artists.” [Read More…]

Painters Jade Leyva and Cheri Vilona premiere some of their latest work in an exhibit opening on July 6 at Mill Contemporary.

“I’ve never shown this particular body of work before,” explains Leyva, who was born in Mexico City and calls Placitas, New Mexico home. “Many of the images in these paintings are based in my childhood and out of my imagination.”

Leyva describes her style as “magical realism.” Paintings are filled with imaginary people (some of whom remind her of friends and family members), birds and flowers. Leyva loves bees, which have been included in her paintings during the past several years. “These creatures are so beautiful,” she says. “Their wings are like lace.”

Ripe watermelons are also featured in some of Leyva’s paintings. “I grew watermelons when I was little,” she recalls. “They were an integral part of my childhood.” [Read More…]

“I weave and design clothing but wanted to experiment and get out of my long-time comfort zone,” says Natasha Nargis, the owner of Natasha Santa Fe, about her work in the show “Deconstructed/Reconstructed.”

Opening on June 29, “Deconstructed/Reconstructed” features pieces by a small group of artists, including a few architects, who enjoy the process of taking things apart and putting them back together in different ways.

“The idea for this exhibit came to me as I looked through boxes of black and white photographs I had taken and printed in the darkroom more than 10 year ago,” Nargis explains. “Taking something apart and creating something new has always intrigued me, so I carefully tore the old images, weaving them to create something new.” [Read More…]

It’s time for another exciting season of Santa Fe Bandstand, an annual summer-long music festival that’s produced by the non-profit organization Outside In Productions.

Beginning on June 21 and running through August 10, Santa Fe Bandstand presents solo, regional and national solo acts and bands playing everything from Latin, salsa, country and bluegrass sounds to blues, funk, rock and jazz tunes.

While most of the performances take place on the Santa Fe Plaza, four evenings of music are presented at Swan Park in the southside of town.

One of June’s special musical artists is Delphia, a singer/songwriter who started her career as a country/folk/rock musician touring throughout the New York/Philadelphia metropolitan area and playing with musicians including Leon Russel, Wishbone Ash and Melody Gardot. [Read More…]