Santa Fe Public Library
Library Catalog || Online Resources

Permanent Art Library Collections

• Tinwork by Jimmy Romero
• Bindings VIII at Main Library
• Woven Olla at Southside Branch Library
• Storyteller Horse at the Main Library

May 2013 Art Exhibits

• Main Library Tybie Davis Satin Gallery: Batik and Watercolors by, respectively, mother and daughter, Ann Shannon Feighney and Annie Lenney; Reception Thursday, May 2, 5pm-7pm
• Main Library Display Cases: Children's Summer Reading Program by Santa Fe Children's Department
• Oliver La Farge Branch: Children's Summer Reading Program by Santa Fe Children's Department
• Southside Branch: Fantasy Kazul by Pamela Macias

back to top

Applications to Exhibit Art

The Santa Fe Public Library accepts applications from local artists for consideration for exhibits. All applicants must live in the city or county of Santa Fe and be eligible for a library card. Click here for Exhibit Information and Guidelines.

Artists wishing to exhibit their work at the Southside Branch Library may pick up an application at the Southside Reference desk. The Art Committee will set a date to review and schedule art displays. For more information, please call (505) 955-2824.

Artists wishing to exhibit their work at the Main Library may bring their work to the Library's Pick Room on the first Wednesday of each month at 2:00p.m. Artists are asked to bring three representative pieces of their work for review. Paintings, as well as photographic exhibits, will be considered. The Main Library also has glass cases for three dimensional work. For more information, please call the Main Library's Media Dept. at (505) 955-6717. Click here for the Main Library Exhibit Application

Artists interested in displaying their art at the Oliver La Farge Branch Library should contact (505) 955-4866 to fill out an application.

back to top

Ever wondered about the tinwork on your library card?

Click on the tinwork below to learn more about it.

back to top

Bindings VIII at the Main Library

Bindings VIII by Gary Beals is a sculpture courtesy of the City of Santa Fe's, Art on Loan Program. Bindings VIII is on display in the front garden of the Main Library at 145 Washington Avenue. The sculpture is 8' x 18" x 18" and is constructed of fabricated steel with a powder-coated finish.

Beals, a local artist, says of his sculptures, "I allow the weathering steel to rust naturally. It's an ideal material for outdoor sculpture since it rusts up to a point, developing a rich walnut brown color, and then stops rusting. The sculpture will never reach the point of deterioration."

For more information about Bindings VIII, contact The Karan Rhlen Gallery.

back to top

Woven Olla at the Southside Branch Library

Woven Olla by Minneapolis-based public artist, Randy Walker, is an eight-foot diameter olla, or Native American water-carrying pot, woven with brilliant strands of fiber that hangs at the main exterior of the Southside Branch Library.

In 2008, the City of Santa Fe Arts Commission, in collaboration with the Santa Fe Public Library and New Mexico Arts, commissioned Walker to create the three-dimensional, suspended steel and fiber olla. The sculpture references a traditional Pueblo water jar, or olla, and reinterprets it on a scale appropriate to the community and the library. Woven Olla is a unifying form that marks the entry as a gathering place. The piece is an analogy for the library as a container of knowledge, a resource no less precious than water.

back to top

About the Storyteller Horse

Storyteller, by artist Ellen Alexander, is one of the Painted Ponies from New Mexico's, Trail of Painted Ponies, a statewide Public Art fundraising project, which featured life-size painted ponies. Storyteller was auctioned off to benefit the Santa Fe Seniors Activity Fund Corp. The purchasers kindly offered to let her stay on display in the Southwest Reading Room at the Main Library.

back to top