Painted: Our Bodies, Hearts, and Village

An illuminating corrective to the limiting perspective of the Pueblo people put forth by the Taos Society of Artists.

Drawn to the region in pursuit of what they described as uniquely American subjects, the founding members of the Taos Society of Artists (TSA)-a group of Anglo-American painters active in the early 20th century-traveled to Pueblo homelands and encountered a thriving artistic world with a rich tradition of commerce and exchange. The TSA artists painted their impressions of Taos Pueblo, and, diverging from the lived experiences of Pueblo people, their works reflect a complex network of relationships and power dynamics between the artists and their chosen subject matter. Painted centers Pueblo perspectives on the contexts that informed the social and cultural landscape of Taos, New Mexico, from 1915 to 1927.

The volume also sheds light on issues that affect Native people today, in the Southwest and beyond, and presents paintings by TSA artists in dialogue with works by modern and contemporary Native American artists.