New Ground: The Southwest of Maria Martinez and Laura Gilpin

Contemporaries and friends, potter Maria Martinez (ca. 1887–1980) and photographer Laura Gilpin (1891–1979) brought the American Southwest into focus as a culturally rich region that fostered artistic expression. 

Martinez’s bold adaptation of an ancient black-on-black pottery design technique reflected Pueblo artistic traditions and also appealed to the modernist sensibility. Gilpin was one of the first women to capture the landscape and peoples of the American West on film. 

Organized by the Philbrook Museum of Art in Tulsa, Oklahoma, this exhibition features 26 significant works by Martinez and 48 platinum, gelatin silver, and color print photographs by Gilpin. It explores the way these two artists worked from the 1930s to ’70s to shape the image of a modern Southwest.

Exhibition overview from museum website