54th Annual Traditional Spanish Market

The rich Hispanic culture of Northern New Mexico will be celebrated at the 54th Annual Traditional Spanish Market, Saturday and Sunday, July 29th and 30st, 2006.The oldest and largest exhibition and sale of Spanish colonial art forms in the United States, the Spanish Market features more than 300 traditional Hispanic artists, continuous live music, art demonstrations and regional foods. It is a unique opportunity for visitors to enjoy a taste of New Mexico's vibrant Spanish culture, both past and present. Admission is free to the public.

The first Spanish Market, was held in1926.  It was designed to to support the artistic growth of Hispanic artists who were native to New Mexico and southern Colorado and working in traditional art forms.  A smaller Winter Market is held in downtown Santa Fe each December. Today, the Spanish Market has become the largest exhibition of traditional Hispanic Arts in the United States.

The Spanish Market is an event that attracts the local community, tourists and serious collectors from around the world. In addition to the native New Mexican adult artists, a special youth exhibition area features the artwork of some 100 children, ages 6 to 17, who are developing skills passed down through the generations. The traditional art forms featured each year at the Spanish Market include the following:

• Santos - depictions of religious figures in the forms of bultos (carvings in the round), retablos (paintings on wooden panels), and gesso and wood relief-carved panels.

• Hide Paintings - religious images painted on deer or elk hide

• Straw Appliqué - crosses, chests and boxes decorated with applied straw

• Textiles - hand-woven on looms using handspun yarns

• Furniture - usually made from pine using mortise and tenon joints

• Colcha - unique regional embroideries employing the colcha stitch

• Tinwork - decorative and utilitarian objects of cut and punched tin

• Ironwork - tools, fastenings, and household objects forged from iron

• Precious Metals - silver or gold jewelry, utilitarian and devotional objects

• Pottery - hand-sculpted bowls, pots, and other ware made from micaceous clay

• Bonework - decorative items, anillos (rings) and tool handles carved from bones

• Ramilletes - decorative paper garlands
  Basketry - baskets hand woven from red and brown river willow

The Spanish Market is sponsored and produced by the Spanish Colonial Arts Society. The Society's collection of more than 3,500 art objects is housed at the Museum of Spanish Colonial Art which opened in July 2002 in Santa Fe. The collections include Spanish colonial art forms covering four centuries and four continents.

For more information
Call -  505-982-2226
click - www.spanishcolonial.org

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The Santa Fe Indian Market

Come to Santa Fe in August and buy your colorful, provocative art directly from the Indian artisans who make it. Every year in August, since 1924, artists from national and regional tribes have been sharing their culture, traditions, and art with the world. Come this year and you'll see over 1,200 artists from about 100 tribes who show their work in over 600 booths. 

The event attracts an estimated 100,000 visitors to Santa Fe from all over the world. Buyers, collectors and gallery owners come to the Indian Market to take advantage of the opportunity to buy directly from the artists. For many visitors, this is a rare opportunity to meet the artists and learn about contemporary Indian arts and cultures.

The Santa Fe Indian Market has been a fixture in Santa Fe since 1922 and celebrates centuries of Native American arts, and has introduced the world to the works of painters, jewelers, potters, sculptors, weavers and other artist, whose ancestors were here long before the Pilgrims arrived in Plymouth, Mass.

Over the years, the Market has created and promoted new trends, given artists a chance at exposure and fame, and provided the public with a chance to explore a different category of art, whether they be turquoise inlays on shell pendants, silver concha belts, or golden bracelets set with precious gems.

Whether you're a frequent visitor to Santa Fe or you've never been to New Mexico, whether you're an avid collector or know nothing about North American Indian arts, you'll find a visit to the Santa Fe Indian Market an intellectually stimulating and broadening experience.

For more information
Call - 505-982-2226 
click -  http://www.swaia.org/market.php

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