NMMA News:
SANTA FE — This spring, the New Mexico Museum of Art presents Paul Burlin: An American Modernist in the Southwest, an exhibition that reintroduces Paul Burlin (1886–1969) as a foundational yet long-overlooked figure in American Modernism. On view from March 21 through October 18, 2026, the exhibition centers Burlin’s deep and formative relationship with New Mexico and illuminates his role in shaping a distinctly American modern art.
Burlin’s career took a decisive turn in 1912 when married collectors George A. Harris (1889–1960) and Lillian D. Harris (1892–1922) acquired his painting Figure of a Woman. That initial encounter sparked decades of patronage and collaboration, resulting in an extraordinary body of commissioned murals, paintings, and Southwest-inspired scenes. Carefully preserved by successive generations of the Harris family, these works ultimately entered the museum’s collection, where their full significance can now be appreciated by the public.
At the heart of the exhibition are Burlin’s early mural paintings—Stone Age, Rhapsody, and Awakening—created for the Harrises’ Manhattan apartment and profoundly shaped by his 1910 visit to New Mexico. Painted before the watershed Armory Show, the murals reveal Burlin’s remarkably early engagement with European modernism. Fauvist color, the structural rigor of Paul Cézanne (1839–1906), and cubist-inspired geometry converge with imagery drawn from Pueblo life along the Rio Grande. The result is an artist already forging new terrain between international avant-garde ideas and American subject matter.
Recently conserved, the murals now glow with renewed intensity, restoring the bold color and formal ambition that once defined Burlin’s vision. Together, these works position Burlin as a pivotal figure who bridged continents and cultures, helping to shape a modern art rooted in place yet conversant with the most radical ideas of his time.
“Paul Burlin was experimenting boldly with modernist ideas before many American audiences had even encountered them,” said Alexandra Terry, New Mexico Museum of Art’s Head of Curatorial Affairs. “What makes this body of work especially compelling is how deeply rooted it is in New Mexico. He wasn’t simply borrowing from European modernism—he was transforming it through his experience of place, light, and culture in the Southwest.”
Paul Burlin: An American Modernist in the Southwest offers audiences a rare opportunity to reconsider a key chapter in American art history and to experience firsthand the vibrant, cross-cultural currents that animated the Southwest in the early twentieth century.
About The New Mexico Museum of Art
The New Mexico Museum of Art is a division of the Department of Cultural Affairs. Programs and exhibits are supported by the Museum of New Mexico Foundation and its donors. The mission of the Museum of Art is to create authentic experiences that foster a deeper understanding and enjoyment of art throughout our state. With a collection of more than 20,000 pieces of work, the museum brings the art of the world to New Mexico and the art of New Mexico to the world.