Page 9 of 12
Santa Fe, New Mexico
Girl with crimson nails, Jesus round her neck
A one day slideshow respite from all those cliffs and deserts and mesas and rocks takes us to Santa Fe, a surprisingly small city in the shadow of the Sangre de Cristo, the blood of Christ Mountains of New Mexico. Officially founded as part of New Spain in 1610 on the site of an abandoned pueblo, it is one of the oldest cities in the country, not as old as Jamestown and St Augustine but older than Plymouth. In addition to its smallness and its history, Santa Fe prides itself on its culture and arts scene, it has the country's second largest amount of art galleries (after New York) and at least one must see museum in the Georgia O'Keefe Museum, a fittingly small, one artist museum that does its best with what it has. And while the galleries and museums everywhere are hard to miss, it was even harder to miss the art fair which took over the city's central plaza (creatively called "the plaza") with booth after booth of people selling things which were often described as art. So while I did not get a chance to see the plaza in all its glory, I did get a chance to see lots of paintings of coyotes, people selling hats for dogs and had a chance to grab some damn tasty kettle corn. All things considered it probably worked out for the best.
Right in Santa Fe's historic core, at the end of San Francisco Street and just a block off the plaza, stands Saint Francis Cathedral, the spiritual center of a spiritual town. Everywhere you look it's hard to escape both religion and, more specifically, St Francis himself. The city Santa Fe translates (I think) to Holy Faith, but the city's real name takes it a step further. La Villa Real de la Santa Fe de San Francisco de Asis means (according to Wikipedia) the Royal City of the Holy Faith of Saint Francis of Assisi. Try fitting that one on a postcard or t-shirt.
The Loretto Chapel is more than just a former chapel turned tourist attraction, it is a former chapel turned tourist attraction with a legend to boot. Apparently long ago (the 1870s) the nuns who operated the chapel really, really wanted to build a staircase up to the balcony but didn't know how to do it. A mysterious stranger showed up and offered to build the stair, coming up with a design with no visibly obvious support columns. He built it and then disappeared after completing it months later without being paid or identified. The implied explanation is that god or some saint spends their spare time slowly building spiral staircases, and such a story is all you need. The chapel was deconsecrated as a catholic chapel back in the 1970s and now runs as a pure for profit attraction that milks that story for all that it's worth. Step right up to see the miraculous staircase! Only $2 per person! Children under 6 free!
Some call him their lord and savior, some call him king of kings, some call him one third of their god, but all can agree to at least call him a statue of a guy with long hair a beard. Still in the Loretto Chapel, Jesus himself looks down and away, either oblivious to or complicit with the money changers who have taken over the temple, er, chapel.
No matter how I write this it's going to sound obnoxious, elitist and mean, so I'll just go ahead without any of the usual pretenses. The reason that there are so many galleries and so much art in Santa Fe is that (in general) the threshold and accepted standard of what is considered good art is surprisingly low. Sure there are exceptions but overall you are not looking at an art scene to rival, well, any good art scene anywhere. Just because there's a lot of it doesn't mean that it's good. I hate to be sound obnoxious, elitist and mean, but sadly it's the truth.
That said, if I ever decide to give up architecture and try to become an entry level artist, I'm headed right to Santa Fe where competence equals success, or at least competence equals window space in a gallery a block (or so) right off the plaza. I'll spend all day vaguely ripping off Georgia O'Keefe paintings but instead use bright, flat colors like everyone else, painting another lifeless composition of mountains, clouds, rivers and (if I'm feeling really frisky) a cactus over and over and over again. At least it's a plan.
One last Santa Fe slide. This is from my comfortable, centrally located historic hotel (the Hotel St Francis), where even the art above the bed once again reminds you that you are smack dab in the Royal City of the Holy Faith of Saint Francis of Assisi, Santa Fe.
