S
anta Fe (January 20, 2016)—Doth thou love William Shakespeare? Then February’s your month. The New Mexico Museum of Art features First Folio! The Book that Gave Us Shakespeare, in collaboration with the New Mexico History Museum’s The Book’s the Thing: Shakespeare from Stage to Page. Come throughout the month to each museum for lectures, performances, hands-on art activities and more.
Here are ways we’ll help you fall in love with history this February, including a few non-Shakespearean ones:
Friday, February 5, 5–7 pm: Opening of The Book’s the Thing: Shakespeare from Stage to Page
Explore the history of publishing Shakespeare with printing demonstrations, book-arts creations, a marbled-paper-and-calligraphy collaboration of Shakespearean quotes, and more. For details on the exhibit, click here. A Free First Friday event; free admission 5–8 pm.
àImage above: Santa Fe book artist Will Karp’s “Henry VIII.” Download a high-res version by clicking here.)
Tuesdays–Sundays, February 6–28, 1:30–3:30 pm, Printing demonstrations
Palace Press printers Thomas Leech and James Bourland demonstrate Shakespeare-style printing on a replica Gutenberg press in the exhibit space for The Book’s the Thing: Shakespeare from Stage to Page. Free with admission.
Wednesday, February 10, noon: “The AT&SF Railroad and the Pueblo Indians 1880–1930”
Richard Frost delivers a Brainpower & Brownbags Lecture in the Meem Community Room. A Santa Fe resident, Frost is professor emeritus of American history and Native American studies at Colgate University. He wrote The Railroad and Pueblo Indians: The Impact of the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe on the Pueblos of the Rio Grande, 1880–1930 (University of Utah Press, 2015). Free; seating is limited.
Download a high-res image for the lecture by clicking here.
Frday, February 12, 9 am: CreativeMornings tackles ethics
Robert and Renee Innis, owners of Rinse Design and co-founders of Design Corps Santa Fe, explore the global theme of “ethics” at this month’s event. Network with other creative professionals. Coffee and pastries courtesy of Iconik Coffee Roasters. Free.
Download a high-res image of Robert and Renee Innis by clicking here.
Saturday, February 13, 11 am: Music and design preview for the Santa Fe Opera’s Unshakeable
To commemorate both Shakespeare’s 400th anniversary and its own 60th, the Santa Fe Opera commissioned a new work from composer Joseph Illick, with a libretto by Andrea Fellows Walters. Mixing Shakespeare and sci-fi, Unshakeable travels 25 years into the future after a pandemic called “Erasure” has corroded people’s memories. Will Shakespearean actors and former lovers Wyatt and Meridian reconnect and restore their bond? Hear selections performed by baritone Samuel Schultz, soprano Jacquelyn Stucker, and Joseph Illick.
Free in the New Mexico History Museum auditorium; reservations required. Go to the Santa Fe Opera box office or call (505) 986-4900 or (800) 280-4654. Seating is limited.
For more details on this event, click here.
Download high-res images of the performers and design studies by clicking here.
Sunday, February 21, 1:30–3:30 pm: Family Fun Day
Check out First Folio and The Book’s the Thing, then come to the History Museum classroom to learn how to use crow quill pens and practice calligraphy, Shakespeare-style. Free with admission; Sundays free to NM residents and all children.
Tuesday, February 23, 10 am: Community-in-Residence at the History Museum
Local arts organizations and Gary Glazner, founder of the internationally acclaimed Alzheimer’s Poetry Project, lead a fun-filled morning creating poetry and song inspired by The Book’s the Thing: Shakespeare from Stage to Page. This event is crafted especially for people with memory illnesses and their care partners, though everyone is welcome to participate. Free.
Sunday, February 26: Last day to see Fading Memories: Echoes of the Civil War
Take in a sobering history lesson in our Mezzanine Gallery. Three curators—Meredith Davidson, Daniel Kosharek and Tom Leech—approach the subject from different angles and invite visitors to consider how fragments of memories and a long-gone war still define us as Americans. Free with admission; Sundays free to NM residents.
Download high-res images by clicking here.
Friday, February 26, 6 pm: “Hamlet, Hamlet, Hamlet”
Joshua Calhoun, an assistant professor of English at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, talks about the three distinct versions of Hamlet produced in the 1600s. The Bad Quarto, Good Quarto, and First Folio are often mixed into one during modern performances. The result? A Hamlet who seems more passive and indecisive than the one in the First Folio. Calhoun specializes in Shakespeare, 16th– and 17th-century poetry, and the history of media. Free; seating is limited.
For more details on this event, click here.
Download a high-res image of Calhoun by clicking here.