Gift of Water, by Monika Steinhoff. Courtesy/NMHU
NMHU News:
The 9th Annual New Mexico Painters’ Exhibition at Highlands University’s Kennedy Hall will be on view 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., weekdays Sept. 11 to Oct. 31.
The opening reception is 4-7 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 11. Although the gallery is not typically open weekends, the exhibition will be on view 9-11 a.m., Sept. 17 during the NMHU Homecoming parade.
The exhibition will feature a range of artists from Northern New Mexico, including community artists and NMHU students and employees. Many of the artists in the exhibition have shown work in previous Painters’ Exhibitions, including this year’s featured artist, Monica Steinhoff.
Steinhoff is a resident of Santa Fe and has been painting for decades. NMHU Foundation Art Curator and Archivist Renée Buchanan said Steinhoff’s work often deals with women and political issues surrounding women.
“Steinhoff has these dreamscapes that are kind of surreal. She takes from experiences from her own reality, but they are almost dream memory narratives,” Buchanan said. “They can be her own memories or based on current events or things that inspire her.”
Buchanan said New Mexico landscapes are a common theme among painters at the annual exhibition.
“They really bring their unique perspective and style to it,” Buchanan said. “You’d think that an exhibition with a lot of landscapes would look the same, but they’re so thematically different, from more modern painting techniques to some very traditional, realistic painting techniques.”
In addition to landscapes, Buchanan said the show this year will feature portraiture as well as some abstract artists working in geometric color forms. Buchanan said notable artists in the exhibition include Gayther Gonzales, Sharon Stillwater, Janet Romero, Sandra Place and Nocona Burgess.
“One of our artists, Eli Levin, does a lot of paintings speaking to different issues in our country,” Buchanan said. “Last year, he did many on immigration under the Trump era and ICE laws and how that affects our country. And he’s done things on police brutality—so, kind of hotbed issues in our nation as a whole.”
The New Mexico Painters’ Exhibition is a jury-selected show. The exhibition’s co-founders, Dr. Robert Bell and Dr. James Mann, serve as the jurors. According to Buchanan, Dr. Bell donated a substantial art collection to the NMHU Foundation to serve as a teaching resource for students. Likewise, Dr. Bell sees the Exhibition as an opportunity for student artists and ensures their inclusion in the show each year.
“There’s no exhibition that gathers Northern New Mexico painters together like this one, and Dr. Bell thought it would be beneficial for students to see what contemporary painters in the state are doing,” Buchanan said. “It’s usually a students’ first gallery show and they’re displaying artwork with professional artists, so it’s a big learning experience for them. I also recruit them to come help set up the show, so they get some curatorial lessons as well.”
One of the new students showing work in this year’s exhibition is NMHU anthropology instructor, Kallie Wilbourn. Wilbourn said she has taken a lot of drawing courses in the past but just started painting last spring. For now, she has been painting portraits, but she said it is too soon to make any decisions about her style or subject matter.
“I really like painting people because I like character and trying to actually present a person as they look, which is not all that easy,” Wilbourn said. “I paint people who are memorable in my life, who I’ve had an emotional connection to, or people who have impressed me in some way.”
Wilbourn said she is currently working on a series of portraits of her mother at different times in her life. As a self-identified film buff, Wilbourn said she is also working on placing actors from old film noir movies in fictional settings with actors from modern film noir.
“I don’t know those people; the characters were just so well acted and realized that I wanted to do something with them,” Wilbourn said. “It’s a way of using my fascination with film, which has gone on since I was a kid. I used to watch those old films when I was really small at my grandmother’s.”
Buchanan said there will be a smaller, virtual version of the exhibition available online at https:////galleries.nmhu.edu/currently-at-the-kennedy-gallery/. She said that while they were excited to host the exhibition in person last year, she is looking forward to an even bigger show this year.
“We have almost 40 artists participating this year so it’s exciting to have a regular show again,” Buchanan said. “It’s good to have that and to build that momentum for the future.”
The New Mexico Painters’ Exhibition will close with a Halloween-themed party Oct. 31. Times for the closing reception will be announced closer to the event.