Current and Upcoming Exhibitions

Inspired by Calligraphy
Ulfert Wilke and Peter Bilan



March 28 - July 26, 2020
Spring River Gallery

Calligraphy is the art of decorative handwriting, and there are some stunningly beautiful examples of it throughout the world. Rather than focus on calligraphy itself, however, this exhibit will showcase pieces from RMAC’s permanent collection that were inspired by forms of calligraphy. Read More
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Tonee Harbert
Roswell Artist-in-Residence



March 21 - May 3, 2020
Marshall and Winston Gallery
Opening Reception: Friday, March 27
5:30pm: Lecture
6-7 pm: Reception

Tonee Harbert’s photography considers human interaction with the landscape. Any purpose people impose on the land leaves a mark which may be overt, or can faintly show a past narrative. These signs/ signals inhabit our everyday world, where collectively they can take on the qualities of a dream or myth. Read More
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Decades:
The 1950s



February 22 - August 9, 2020
Horgan and Graphics Galleries

The 1950s are often remembered as conservative and calm years of economic prosperity with a focus on traditional nuclear families and “futuristic” technology. Read More
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Remembering 
Bruce Lowney



January 18 - March 15, 2020
Spring River Gallery

Former Roswell Artist-inResidence, Bruce Lowney (1970-71, 1974-75) passed away on October 5, 2019. In remembrance, the Roswell Museum will be showcasing fourteen of his lithographs and paintings from our collection. 
Read More
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SV Randall: as pair legged
Roswell Artist-in-Residence



January 25 - March 8, 2020
Marshall and Winston Gallery
Opening Reception: Friday, January 24
5:30pm: Lecture
6-7pm: Reception

Roswell Artist-In-Residence SV Randall has always been drawn to how architecture and common commodities influence the ways in which we traverse the world. Deeply inspired by opposing notions of interiority and exteriority, his sculptures often address topics of boundaries and barriers. Through the poetry of everyday experience and the use of symbolically charged materials, many of his artworks mimic the veneer of different strands in American society’s material culture. 
Read More
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Winter Celebrations


November 30, 2019 - January 5, 2020
Spring River Gallery
Opening in conjunction with our Holiday Open House
Saturday, December 7, 4-6pm

Traditionally, the dark and cold of winter meant that people would more often stay inside their homes, spending less time with friends and eating whatever would keep during the season when little grows. Read More
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Cedra Wood
Roswell Artist in-Residence



November 23, 2019 - January 12, 2020
Marshall and Winston Gallery
Opening Reception: Friday, November 22
5:30pm: Lecture
6-7pm: Reception

Roswell Artist-In-Residence Cedra Wood has long been in the grip of an obsession: the eerie, visceral, and unsettling tales found in ancient Scottish and English ballads. For her exhibition at RMAC, she presents paintings inspired by this fixation. Ranging from darkly funny to moody and morbid, the miniature works depict transmuted snakes, prophetic selkies, wax babies, and other elements meant to evoke an eldritch time and place—a lyrical and symbolic otherworld that has been perpetuated by word of mouth for centuries. Read More 

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Axle Contemporary
E Pluribus Unum: New Mexico Southeast


November 16, 2019 - April 12, 2020
Entry Gallery
Opening with gallery talk by the artists in conjunction with the RMAC Holiday Open House
December, 7, 2019 | 4-6 pm

In 2012, the Axle artist-collaborators, Jerry Wellman and Matthew Chase-Daniel, began a photographic portrait project, E Pluribus Unum. This ongoing project enlivens and documents communities throughout the state of New Mexico with a mobile photographic portrait studio built inside a vintage aluminum vehicle.

In October 2018, Wellman and Chase-Daniel brought their mobile studio to southeast New Mexico to photograph the diversity of the people who live here. Participants each brought a small object of personal significance, and sat for a black and white portrait while holding the object. Objects have included car keys, photos of loved ones, artworks, tools, books, food, toys, and vintage collectibles. Read More
 
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A Line in the Sand

A regional collaboration with 516ARTS

November 9, 2019 - May 24, 2020
Hunter Gallery
Opening Reception: 
Friday, November 8 | 5-7pm

The political boundary between the United States and Mexico has an unstable history, with both the location and the importance of the border shifting across this remote region over time. If not for the geographers, surveyors, and scientists sent to map the border, the secretive animals of the mountains, deserts, and rivers might have evaded notice for a long time. Read More

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Sharbani Das Gupta
In/Sight

October 26, 2019 - April 5, 2020
Donald B. Anderson Gallery
Opening Reception: 
Friday, October 25 | 5-7pm

Splitting her time between India and the United States, Sharbani Das Gupta uses the perspective she gains from her travels to create immersive environments that give viewers the opportunity to enter an alternative kind of space. Das Gupta has a keen awareness of the human impact on the planet, and she often explores the ecological and social residues of political upheaval. Her allegorical rather than confrontational approach opens a space for empathy and understanding while still emphasizing the need for action. She uses her work to draw attention to the not-so-hidden but often disregarded links between ourselves and the worlds we inhabit and impact. Read More

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Decades: 1930s and 1940s



August 24, 2019- February 9, 2020
Marshall and Winston Gallery

The art that is produced in any given era gives later audiences a small glimpse of what it was like to live in that time period. That is the idea behind the Decades series of exhibitions that will be featured at RMAC over the next four years. We begin with the 1930s and 1940s, partly because the Museum was founded in 1937, and partly because of our rich holdings from these decades. Read More
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Made in New Mexico

December 1, 2018 - long term display
Patricia Gaylord Anderson Gallery

New Mexico is home to a lot of great things, from important historical sites and diverse state parks to roasted green and red chilies. It’s also a land rich with artistic traditions, and continues to be an inspiration to artists today. Native artists and craftsmen have been working here for centuries, while artists such as Georgia O’Keeffe and Marsden Hartley have traveled here seeking new ideas for their work. Today New Mexico continues to attract artists from around the world, whether they seek the mountains of Santa Fe or the unique community of the Roswell Artist-in-Residence Program. Art has always been one of New Mexico’s strongest assets, and will undoubtedly continue to be one of its defining features in the twenty-first century. Read More

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Robert H. Goddard: The Father of Modern Rocketry 
On Permanent Display
Goddard Gallery and Workshop Recreation


In 1898, a teenage Robert Hutchings Goddard (1882-1945), captivated by the realism of H.G. Wells’ War of the Worlds, “…imagined how wonderful it would be to make some device which had even the possibility of ascending to Mars.” He began enthusiastically filling notebooks with ideas for getting off the planet. As a graduate student in physics at Clark College in Worcester, Massachusetts, his hometown, he conducted simple tests with gun powder that suggested it was indeed possible to construct a rocket for space travel.

 Read More

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Hurd & Wyeth: Picturing the Hondo Valley


On Permanent Display
Founders Gallery



The Roswell Museum and Art Center is home to the largest public collection of works by Peter Hurd and Henriette Wyeth, painters who have both become synonymous with the landscape and culture of southeastern New Mexico. Peter Hurd (1904-1984) was raised in Roswell where his father worked a small ranch southwest of town. Much of his youth was spent astride a horse, and he was known for his equestrian abilities. Roaming the countryside as a youth on horseback earned Hurd an intimate understanding of the hills, prairies, and arroyos that configured the surrounding landscape. Read more
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West of Beyond: The Rogers and Mary Ellen Aston Collection of the American West


On Permanent Display
Aston Galleries



Donated by Rogers Aston, The Aston Collection of the American West is one  of the most popular and historically significant aspects of the Roswell Museum and Art Center’s holdings. An independent oil producer, rancher, sculptor, and philanthropist, Aston developed a keen interest in the West during time spent on his family’s various ranches. Read more

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