MOIFA | May 2024

Volodymyr Balyberdin, b. 1954, “Memory of the Heart” Collection, 2022/2023, cast brass ammunition casings collected by volunteers near the town of Izyum after the liberation of the Kharkiv region. Photo courtesy of the artist.

Save the date for Amidst Cries from the Rubble: Art of Loss and Resilience from Ukraine
A little longer, a little longer — and cherry blossoms will bloom,
alighting petals, the dreams of unearthed roots.
War paints watercolors with blood.
Its palette — the ashes of fires.
Its landscape — the ruins of buildings.
Empty streets as faded pastels.
Perhaps somewhere amidst cries from the rubble,
a tulip will suddenly sprout.
- Lina Kostenko, b. 1930

Opening on June 23 in the Mark Naylor and Dale Gunn Gallery of Conscience, the Amidst Cries from the Rubble: Art of Loss and Resilience from Ukraine exhibition will feature large-scale color photographs and objects from war-torn Ukraine. Appropriating remnants of war—bullet and shell casings, helmets, ammunition boxes—the exhibition will explore how Ukrainians are coping with the daily trauma of death, loss, and destruction that comes from their lived experience. Items of war are reclaimed and reimagined as sites of human creativity by children, spouses, parents, injured soldiers, and artists in a way that reflects Ukrainian cultural perspectives and folk-art practices. Programming throughout the run of the exhibition will include musical performances, film series, lectures and artist demonstrations. The exhibition runs through April 20, 2025.

Partnership with Cooking with Kids

Instructors from Cooking with Kids making khamsas as part of a lesson in Middle Eastern culture and cuisine

MOIFA education is partnering with Cooking with Kids (CWK) instructors again this year to lead a khamsa art project to enhance their Middle Eastern cooking unit. MOIFA provides the materials and lesson plan for all the CWK classes, reaching over 5,000 students across the region.

According to Anna Farrier, Executive Director of CWK, they are always scheming each year about which unit they are going to do with the folk art project. She stated, “It adds so much to our program. It’s like the culture connection and food is folk art. So, it’s the perfect connection and we are grateful!”

The museum has been partnering with CWK for almost 30 years and helps provide art-making activities that complement their lessons that educate and empower children and families to make healthy food choices through hands-on nutrition education with fresh, affordable foods and learn about the cultures from which the recipes originate.

We are grateful to the Patricia Arscott La Farge Foundation for Folk Art and to other donors to the museum’s Education Fund for their generous support of this program.

New Bilingual Gallery Host Program

A new Bilingual Gallery Host Program kicked off this past February at MOIFA. This experimental program provides a bilingual, cross-cultural gallery experience at MOIFA. This program was conceived and spearheaded by MOIFA’s docent coordinator, Dawn Kaufmann, and made possible through an ongoing partnership with the advanced ESL non-credit program at the Santa Fe Community College. The goals in this new Gallery Host training model include: 1) provide multi-lingual gallery hosts on weekends during high visitation periods; 2) provide a full and integrated gallery experience for non-English speaking; 3) to create an open and welcoming museum space for Spanish speakers, especially for our local Santa Fe ESL community. Each ESL student has committed to two onsite interactive training sessions this spring, run by Dawn and our bilingual educator, Kemely Gomez, and will then complete eight independent Gallery Host shifts. The students are self-selected and are further supported by MOIFA with free admission to the Museums during their tenure, gas gift cards for transportation, and a graduation thank you gift card.

TABLE Enjoys a Behind-the-Scenes Tour

TABLE’s Editor-in-Chief Keith Recker and Contributing Editor Tira Howard joined Director of Collections Kate Macuen in the vaults for a day to reveal rarely seen objects recommended by MOIFA’s staff. Stored and meticulously cared for by our Collections’ team, this selection of objects is just a tiny fraction of the, over 160,000 objects that call MOIFA home. You can read complete article here.

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To support MOIFA’s Exhibition Development Fund and/or Education Fund please contact Laura Sullivan at laura@museumfoundation.org or by phone at 505.216.0829.