Marsden Hartley (1877-1943), El Santo, 1919, oil on canvas, 36 x 32”. Collection of the New Mexico Museum of Art. Anonymous gift from a friend of Southwest art, 1919 (523.23P) Photo by Blair Clark.

While many might not think of the Southwest as the most inclusive region of the United States, the New Mexico Museum of Art notes that places like Northern New Mexico offered “a safe space for early queer artists to live unhampered by the stigmas and social restrictions present in other parts of the country.” Yet even in these “open communities,” queer artists of this early era have yet to be fully recognized.

Russell Cheney (1881-1945), New Mexico (Penitente), 1929, oil on canvas, 39½ x 39½”. New Mexico Museum of Art. Gift of Russell Cheney, 1942 (1181.23P) Photo by Cameron Gay.

“This project came out of many years of ongoing research on early 20th-century art of the Southwest, and working to identify stories present in the well-loved genre that have still yet to be told,” says Christian Waguespack, museum head of curatorial affairs and curator of 20th-century art. “Particularly, it grew out of ongoing [research] on artists including Cady Wells, Marsden Hartley and Agnes Sims…As I researched these figures, I was stuck by two things: the prominence of gay and lesbian artists in New Mexico during the early part of the 20th century, and that there is so little writing on the impact of so many talented gay and lesbian cultural figures in our region during this time. I wanted to put this exhibition together to celebrate these people and their lives, and to show that there is still a lot of work to be done on this subject.”

Cady Wells (1904-1954), Head of Santo (Head of Christ), circa 1939, oil and watercolor on paper, 22¾ x 15¼”. New Mexico Museum of Art. Gift of the Cady Wells Estate, 1982 (1982.16.40) Photo by Blair Clark.

The exhibition, with artworks from the museum’s collection and some pieces on loan from other institutions and artists, includes works like that of the famous Hartley (1877-1943). “Like many American modernist painters of the 20th century, Hartley was looking for a distinctly American subject for his artwork,” Waguespack explains. “He first visited New Mexico in 1918 and wrote of the experience, ‘I am an American discovering America.’ In New Mexico, Hartley found what he believed to be definitively American subject matter in the blending of Native, Hispanic and Euro-American cultures, and produced a number of still lifes, including his 1919 paining El Santo, which incorporates distinctive New Mexican objects including Native pottery, textiles and the material culture of Hispanic Catholicism.”

Agnes C. Sims (1910-1990), Deer Dance, circa 1945, carved wood, 21 x 13 x 8”. Collection of the New Mexico Museum of Art. Museum purchase with funds from the Collectors’ Club and Charmay Allred, 1998 (1998.24.1-.4). Photo by Blair Clark. 

“Sims’s artwork was initially influenced by the petroglyphs of the Galisteo Basin...,” says  Waguespack. “Although she referenced them in her work, she did not directly copy the ancient designs she studied but harmonized Southwestern anthropological subject matter with cubist forms. Her interest in cubism can be seen in her geometric breaking up of the picture plane…while her fascination with early Native culture led to an interest in modern Native ceremonies, like the Deer Dance.”