Gene Kloss: New Mexico Etched in Time

GENE KLOSS New Mexico Etched in Time

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Gene Kloss New Mexico Etched in Time

November 30, 2018 - January 1, 2019 Opening Reception Friday, November 30, 5-7 PM

Railyard Arts District | 1613 Paseo de Peralta | Santa Fe, New Mexico 87501 | tel 505.988.3250 www.lewallengalleries.com | contact@lewallengalleries.com

1 etching and drypoint, 12.88 x 18 inches cover: Return of the Processional, 1967,

Gene Kloss New Mexico Etched in Time Gene Kloss is among the major 20th century printmakers, recognized both for her New Mexico landscapes and her images of the Pueblo peoples and the Spanish Penitentes. Over the course of her 70-year career, Kloss created work in a variety of media, though she is most known for her practice as an intaglio printmaker. Of her art, ArtNews wrote, “Gene Kloss is one of our most sensitive and sympathetic interpreters of the Southwest.”

Working in black and white, Kloss recorded the landscape and people of New Mexico without appearing overly sentimental or maudlin. Whether conveying religious or quotidian subjects, Kloss imbued each of her images with an extraordinary sensitivity and nuance through the use of rich blacks, shifting fields of gray, and an unusual level of detail. Kloss would often say, “In this country, everything lifts—the trees, the mountains, the sky.”

Gene Kloss captured life in the pueblos of Jemez, Cochiti, San Felipe, Santo Domingo, and San Ildefonso – festive public events, ceremonies, ordinary tasks like corn husking and making wool.

Kloss observed the pueblos’ general prohibitions against photography or sketching during ceremonial rituals, instead relying on her keen visual memory. She was always welcomed back to sketch the location of dances, and later added the people from memory when making the plate.

While trained as an artist at the San Francisco School of Fine Arts, Kloss was largely self-taught as a printmaker. Kloss was very experimental—developing and perfecting a technique she called "painting" that is recognized today as Kloss’ unique printing technique. Through the direct application of acid onto copper plates with pencils or fine Japanese brushes, Kloss achieved the subtle, painted tones, bright halos, and gradations of dark color for which she is well known.

Kloss’s art received widespread recognition during the 1930s, during which she lived in an old adobe below the Sangre de Cristo Mountains in Taos. A member of the Taos Art colony, she produced a series of prints for the Public Works of Art Project and the Works Progress Administration, images of Pueblo ceremonies as well as those of the Spanish Penitentes, which were reproduced and distributed to public schools across the state. Kloss lived permanently in Taos until her death in 1996.

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In 1925, she married Phillip Kloss and shortened her name, adopting the masculine form of her middle name so that her work would be viewed with an unprejudiced eye and entry into exhibitions would not be denied her. On their honeymoon, the couple visited a relative's ranch in Las Cruces, New Mexico, and then headed for Santa Fe and Taos. With her 60 pound Sturges etching press in tow, they camped in the Taos Canyon for two weeks while Kloss created a number of etchings, her printing press secured with a sack of concrete to a rock at their campsite.

Kloss was the first woman to be inducted into the National Academy of Design as a printmaker. Kloss attended the San Francisco School of Fine Arts and the University of California at Berkeley, where she was introduced to etching by her professor, renowned printmaker Perham Nahl. In 1938, Kloss’ mastery of printmaking was so respected that, in a major Paris exhibition, her work was placed beside that of E. L. Blumenschein and Georgia O'Keeffe. Works by Kloss are in the Metropolitan Museum, the Smithsonian Institution, the Carnegie Institute, the San Francisco Museum of Art, the Library of Congress, and the National Academy of Design.

Gene Kloss and her Sturges press, circa 1952

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Singers over the Bridge, 1961, etching and drypotin, 11 x 14 inches 4

Santo Domingo Pueblo, NM

Midsummer Fiesta, 1972, etching and drypoint, 11.75 x 14.75 inches 5

Firelight is often associated with Christmastime observances at the pueblos. At Taos, the Procession of the Virgin on Christmas Eve is accompanied by enormous bonfires. Some northeastern pueblos observe the Mexican custom of Las Posados, nine days of hospitality from Guadalupe Day to Christmas Eve, which involve building luminarios (little bonfires) throughout the town to light the Virgin on her journey.

Gene Kloss: Etchings by Phillips Kloss

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Pueblo Firelight Dance, 1952, etching, drypoint and aquatint, 11.5 x 16.5 inches 7

Taos, New Mexico

Summer Evening in New Mexico, 1941, etching, drypoint, and aquatint, 8.88 x 11.75 inches

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Pilar, NM

Noonday Shadows, 1941, etching, 7 x 8.5 inches 9

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Winter Woods, 1941, etching, 6.75 x 8.375 inches 11

In Ranchos de Taos, 1973, etching, 5.5 x 7.75 inches

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Return of the Woodgatherers, 1949, etching, drypoint and aquatint, 9.75 x 13.75 inches

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Santo Domingo Pueblo, NM Pueblo Feather Dance, 1973, drypoint, 15 x 12 inches 14

Cruz Trujillo, Taos Pueblo Governor Pueblo Leader, 1965, etching and drypoint, 13.75 x 10.88 inches 15

San Felipe Pueblo, NM, with guest dancers from Zia Pueblo This aquatint portrays a dance held annually on February 2.

Dances open to the public are often only small slices of lengthy performances. This print likely reflects a portion of a Buffalo Dance, which outsiders speculate is performed in aid of successful game hunting. Buffalo dances are widespread among the pueblos, with many similar elements, but combined or enacted differently. Dances may involve one young woman, two matriarchal women, or several women, whom outsiders speculate represent the spirit of the hunt, or perhaps the women and families who inspire the hunters. A chanting chorus, drummers, the hunters themselves, koshare, and men dressed as game such as buffalo, elk, deer, antelope, or birds are also common elements.

Gene Kloss: An American Printmaker (2009), Gene Sanchez

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Song of the Buffalo Hunt, 1979, etching, drypoint and aquatint, 11 x 14 inches

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Canon, NM

Gathering Broom Grass, 1981, etching and drypoint, 6 x 9 inches 18

Carding Wool the Old Spanish Way, 1985, etching and drypoint, 6 x 8 inches 19

Penitente Fires, 1939, etching, drypoint and aquatint, 10.75 x 13.75 inches 20

The adobe house we rented in Taos for ten years was situated across the road from a Penitente morada, a kind of death church. We never snooped on their activities but we couldn't help hearing their shrill fifes and dismal dirges at a funeral ceremony for one of their brotherhood, nor could we help seeing their night fires at Eastertime.

Apprently they held imitation crucifixions on a large wooden cross in the hills behind the morada. The practice was discountenanced by Orthodox Catholics. In fact, the Penitentes were a separate sect. They came from Spain after the communities in New Mexico were well-established.

Gene Kloss: Etchings, Phillips Kloss

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Night Mass of the Penitentes, 1932, drypoint, 5.88 x 8.5 inches

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The Open Road, 1941, etching, drypoint and aquatint, 9.75 x 13.75 inches 24

Chance Encounter, 1965, etching and drypoint, 11.88 x 15 inches

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After mass at the Catholic mission, established during the Spanish colonial days, the procession begins. The patron saint is carried under its canopy, the way lit by many pitch-pine torches and bonfires, the virile Indian song lifts with the smoke to the night sky, the wind blows down from the sacred mountain, the light shifts, revealing all as a varied vibrant manifestation of universal spirit.

Gene Kloss

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Processional at Taos, 1948, etching, drypoint, and aquatint, 9.88 x 13.88 inches 27

Watching the Clowns at Old Cochiti, 1954, drypoint, 11.88 x 8.88 inches 28

Taos Pueblo, on San Geronimo Day (September 30)

Jester's Fun, 1984, etching, 7.38 x 8.75 inches

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Santo Domingo Pueblo, NM

Tribute to the Earth, 1972, etching, drypoint and aquatint, 14.75 x 11.75 inches 30

Taos Pueblo, NM

Dancers Will Bring Rain, 1980, etching and drypoint, 8.88 x 11.88 inches 31

Looking south in Comanche Canyon toward the Pedernal

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Far Across the Rio Grande, 1939, etching, 10 x 14 inches

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Comanche Dance at San Ildefonso, 1983, etching and drypoint, 11 x 13.88 inches 34

Taos Pueblo, NM

Shield Dancers, 1983, etching, drypoint and aquatint, 10.75 x 13.88 inches 35

Santo Domingo Pueblo, NM

On Christmas Day, 1979, etching, drypoint and aquatint, 1.75 x 13.88 inches 36

Zero Weather, 1960, etching and drypoint, 9 x 15 inches 37

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Taos Pueblo Stream, 1983, etching and drypoint, 7.25 x 8.75 inches 39

Laguna Pueblo in 1925, 1983, etching, drypoint and aquatint, 10.88 x 13.88 inches 40

Late Sunlight on the Cliffs, 1941, etching, drypoint and aquatint, 13.75 x 10.75 inches 41

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Railyard Arts District | 1613 Paseo de Peralta | Santa Fe, New Mexico 87501 | tel 505.988.3250 www.lewallengalleries.com | contact@lewallengalleries.com Š 2018 LewAllen Contemporary, LLC 44 Artwork Š LewAllen Galleries