"Three From Santa Fe" is the title of an exhibition of paintings, ceramics and sculpture to be shown May 7 through June 28 in the Department of the Interior Art Gallery, 18th and C Streets, NW, Washington, D.C.
Sponsored by Washington's Center for Arts of Indian America, the three featured artists are employees of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, working and teaching at the unique Institute of American Indian Arts, at Santa Fe, N. M.
Mrs. Stewart L. Udall, President of the Art Center, noted in announcing the exhibit that all three artists have international, reputations. Other internationally famous artists who have been featured at the Gallery during the past year include Yeffe Kimball, noted for her acrylic paintings, Maria Martinez, potter of San Ildefonso, and her son and grandson, Popovi and Tony Da, potters and artists.
The new group includes Otellie Loloma, a Hopi Indian from Second Mesa, Ariz., who teaches ceramics, painting, cultural studies and traditional dances at the Institute; Fritz Scholder, Mission Indian from California, an instructor in Advanced Painting and Art History; and James McGrath of Tacoma, Wash., the Institute's Director of Arts.
Mrs. Udall said that most of their exhibited works will be offered for sale during the two-month span of the showing.
All three of the artists have had works shown in national as well as international exhibits, including one at Blair House in Washington; the Edinburgh and Berlin Art Festivals; the Alaskan Centennial; Washington's Indian Art Center, and Philbrook Art Center, Tulsa, Okla.
An interesting sidelight of the group showing is that Loloma and Scholder are Indians, while McGrath is non-Indian.
While the Indian artists show some non-Indian influence in their work, there is no doubt that McGrath has become very much involved with the mystical and esoteric aspects of the Pueblo Indian idiom of the Santa Fe area, and shows unusual sensitivity for Indian feelings. His work incorporates such materials as feathers, rawhide, sinew and branches in its execution.
Miss Loloma came into the non-Indian world from a reservation background. After training at the School for American Craftsmen, Rochester, N. Y., she began to merge her new-found technical training with the natural shapes and forms of her Hopi inheritance. Today, although her work has a contemporary feeling, she is very much involved in traditional Hopi philosophy and this gives a spiritual dimension to her creations.
Scholder, although of Mission Indian descent, had little access to his Indian background until he joined the Institute's arts faculty in 1964. He had already received recognition for his paintings, identified with abstract expressionism and pop art. Now, Scholder has combined his former way of painting with Indian subject matter, resulting in a new series of pop or Indian "protest art."
The Gallery will be open to the public for "Three From Santa Fe" from 10 A.M. to 4 P.M., Monday through Friday, except holidays. Admission is free.
