1606 Paseo de Peralta, Santa Fe, NM 87501

Guided by artists, rooted in New Mexico, SITE SANTA FE is a dynamic contemporary arts institution, dedicated to exploring conversations of the moment through innovative exhibitions and programs. Since its founding in 1995, the International (formerly known as the SITE SANTA FE Biennial) has been integral to the institution’s mission. When it launched, it was the only community-wide biennial of contemporary art in the United States and one of only a handful around the world. In keeping with SITE SANTA FE’s artist-centric approach, the newly relaunched International provides a creative platform for artists and curators to respond to the unique geography, history, and cultures of New Mexico. Organized by guest curators, the International offers a rare opportunity for artists to realize site-responsive projects that could not be created elsewhere. For thirty years, the have served as a model for international contemporary art exhibitions and have inspired countless exhibitions of its kind globally.

Waffle Garden

Among the unique features of Santa Fe’s Railyard Park is the Waffle Garden: a matrix of sunken beds enclosed by raised, clay-heavy soil walls that, when plotted out in even rows, resemble the familiar breakfast food. A traditional agricultural technique of the Zuni people of western New Mexico, waffle gardening is a 4,000-year-old Indigenous farming practice that is suited to the semi-arid climate of the Southwest. Its structure efficiently conserves water, provides shade, and protects plantings from wind. A kind of living tribute to some of the region’s deepest historic, cultural, and ecological roots, this garden is located within the Railyard Park directly adjacent to SITE SANTA FE. What is now known as Railyard Park and Plaza once served as a hub where two railway systems converged. The surrounding area formerly housed coal and oil depots, lumberyards, and warehouses. Today, its eleven acres encompass fourteen individual gardens, a children’s play area, temporary art installations, and open spaces for private celebrations and public events. Since 2010, the nonprofit Railyard Park Conservancy has maintained stewardship of the area as an environmentally sustainable green space for community engagement.

Palace of the Governors, 113 Lincoln Ave, Santa Fe, NM 87501

For the 12th SITE SANTA FE International, artists Charisse Pearlina Weston (b. 1988, Houston, TX) and Daisy Quezada Ureña (b. 1990, Anaheim, CA) will activate two different galleries of the Palace of the Governors with newly commissioned sculptural, photographic, and installation work. Hosted in this National Historic Landmark, these two artists’ works are placed in dialogue with themes of migration, borders, and identity.

St. Francis Auditorium, 107 West Palace Ave, Santa Fe, NM 87501

As a center for Santa Fe’s performing arts and cultural activities for nearly a century, the St. Francis Auditorium at the New Mexico Museum of Art hosts a new installation by artist Maja Ruznic (b. 1983, Brčko, former Yugoslavia) as part of the 12th SITE SANTA FE International. Ruznic is creating three new large-scale paintings that intervene in the Auditorium’s murals, where the life of St. Francis of Assisi (the patron saint of Santa Fe), is currently depicted in six parts.

53 Old Santa Fe Trail, Santa Fe, NM 87501

Led by fifth-generation art dealer Jed Foutz, the downtown gallery Shiprock Santa Fe is named after Foutz’s hometown—and a sacred mountain with profound cultural significance—on the Navajo Nation in Northern New Mexico. His family began working there as Native American art traders around 1870, and Foutz continues this legacy. Shiprock specializes in vintage and antique Indigenous art—primarily Diné and that of other tribes of the Southwest—from the nineteenth century to the present. Photography, painting, and sculpture by living artists are shown alongside jewelry, ceramics, and basketry from past generations. The so-called “rug room” is dedicated to Diné textiles, including floor coverings, blankets, and other weavings. Alongside this focus on regional Indigenous artists, Shiprock Santa Fe features select international designers of midcentury and contemporary furnishings—a global bent inspired by formative travels in Foutz’s youth. Located on the second story of a nineteenth-century building on Santa Fe’s central Plaza, Shiprock is a multi-room exhibition space for intimate displays of art that spans eras and geographies.

120 Don Gaspar at Water St, Santa Fe, NM 87501

Doodlet’s is a beloved toy store in the heart of downtown Santa Fe—a local institution that has delighted children of all ages for seventy years. The charming novelty shop was founded in 1955 by Theo Raven (Theodora Ruthling) and her mother, Helene Maurer Ruthling, who had the nickname Doodles. Theo’s diminutive nickname, Doodlet—bestowed by local artist Will Shuster—seemed an apt and memorable choice for the shop. There, one can find nostalgic toys, tiny animals, candy, books, and cards, alongside handcrafted folk art, keepsakes, milagros (metal votive offerings), sugar skulls, and a wide array of miniatures. Since its opening, the shop has prioritized experimentation and fostering a sense of wonder. Co-founder Raven was named a Santa Fe Living Treasure—as was her mother, in 1985—and she received the city’s Historic Preservation Award for restoration of the building that houses Doodlet’s, which was constructed in 1870. In 2010, the shop passed to the next owner, “Doodlelise,” who had cherished visiting it as a child. As of 2025, the shop is run once again by a mother-daughter team of Santa Fe locals, who similarly hold fond and formative memories of Doodlet’s irreverent whimsy.

The Green Room, 128 West Palace Ave, Santa Fe, NM 87501

The Green Room is a discreet, intimate lounge within the Best Daze cannabis dispensary on Palace Ave in downtown Santa Fe. Deep forest-green walls, an ornate golden ceiling, Chesterfield sofas, and a wood-paneled bar lend the room a speakeasy feel. Best Daze is a family owned and operated, run by the father-son team of Len and Eli Goodman. Len made his way to Santa Fe in the 1960s where he put down roots; Eli grew up in the city and has remained to raise his own family in his hometown. Best Daze began as a cannabis farm in 2015 and has been named the Best of Santa Fe for several years running. Together, the Goodmans have opened several Best Daze storefronts to serve multiple communities in the Santa Fe area.

Unit 13, 227 Don Gaspar, Santa Fe, NM 87501

Longtime residents and visitors alike will recognize the distinctive facade of Santa Fe Village. Located on Don Gaspar Avenue in downtown Santa Fe, this over 100-year-old adobe shopping center recalls the region’s historic trading posts. These sites of commerce saw products such as sheep’s wool, woven textiles, and rugs bartered for flour, sugar, coffee, and tobacco. In the twentieth century, many remaining trading posts were converted into shopping centers and, conversely, modern shopping centers were designed to evoke those remote businesses, romanticized in popular midcentury images of the Southwest. Santa Fe Village’s storefronts house a variety of businesses, from dining and clothing to jewelry and collectibles. Santa Fe Village’s storied Unit 13 housed the shop of silversmith RM Campbell (also known as ol’ Bear) for 27 years. A Dutch door and triangular display window face onto the shopping center’s interior walkway, offering narrow glimpses into the space. The interior resembles many units within this unique shopping center, with exposed bricks, wooden floors, and the iconic New Mexican vigas (or log beams) that visibly support the ceiling.

492-423 W Water St, Santa Fe, NM 87501 (35°41'18.6"N 105°56'41.6"W)

Located just four blocks off the central plaza in downtown Santa Fe, Las Palomas is a unique inn that showcases the distinctive architecture of the region. This property consists of independent buildings connected by gardens and winding walkways, allowing visitors to more fully experience its traditional adobe structures that once formed a close community. Built in 1890, the casitas (or intimate, single-family homes) were transformed into the present-day boutique hotel in the 1990s by acclaimed opera singer Neil Rosenshein. Rosenshein envisioned Las Palomas as a site for lodging as well as artistic gatherings—a place where the local creative community could come together for conversations around the inn’s fireplace. Once Within a Time utilizes a building on the side of the sprawling property that faces Water Street, a short distance from Las Palomas’s main entrance and lobby on San Francisco Street.

Lloyd’s Treasure Chest, 706 Camino Lejo, Santa Fe, New Mexico 87505

Zhang Xu Zhan (b. 1988, Xinzhuang, Taiwan) will transform the Museum’s Treasure Chest gallery into an immersive multimedia installation featuring paper sculptures, video, and a selection of objects from the Museum’s collection. While growing up, Zhang Xu’s family ran a store in Xinzhuang dedicated to Zhizha, the Taoist craft tradition that employs incense-laced joss paper to make funerary effigies. The artist’s work references this traditional art form while featuring his paper creations in stop-motion films and site-specific installations. Zhang Xu lives and works in Xinzhuang, Taiwan.

Klah Gallery, 704 Camino Lejo, Sante Fe, NM 87505

Aligned with the Wheelwright Museum’s commitment to exhibiting contemporary Indigenous artists, this section of the 12th SITE SANTA FE International is situated in the Museum’s distinctive Klah Gallery and features the work of artists Cristina Flores Pescorán (b. 1986, Lima, Peru), Raven Halfmoon (b. 1991, Norman, OK), Sky Hopinka (b. 1984, Ferndale, WA), and Emmi Whitehorse (b. 1957, Crown Point, NM). An expansive, site-specific installation by Nora Naranjo-Morse (b. 1953, Kha’P’o Owenge, NM) emerges from the center of the unique interior space of the gallery.

1050 Old Pecos Trail, Santa Fe, NM 87505

Situated in the old Santa Fe Armory (La Armeria de Santa Fe), the New Mexico Military Museum hosts a section of the 12th SITE SANTA FE International focused on the supernatural, and featuring work by artists Karla Knight (b. 1958, New York, NY), John McCracken (b. 1934, Berkeley, CA; d. 2011, New York, NY), Hira Nabi (b. 1987, Lahore, Pakistan), and Joseph Yoakum (b. 1891, Ash Grove, MO; d. 1972, Rock Island, IL). Screening in the museum’s spacious auditorium is Ali Cherri’s (b. 1976, Beirut, Lebanon) film, The Watchman (2024), which follows a young soldier standing guard on a contested border on the island of Cyprus under the shadow of war.

1050 Old Pecos Trail, Santa Fe, NM 87505

Founded in 1979, the Center for Contemporary Arts Santa Fe (CCA) is the city’s only independent, nonprofit arthouse cinema. It offers year-round programming and showcases classic, documentary, and first-run independent and foreign films that are not screened anywhere else in the city. CCA has shown over 4,000 films to date and has invited esteemed directors and actors to Santa Fe to speak about their craft. The adjoining gallery space opened in 1985 and has since exhibited major international and regionally based artists. One of James Turrell’s earliest Skyspace sculptures, Blue Blood (1988), was installed outside CCA’s building for thirty years (until it was moved, in 2018, to join the permanent collection of The Contemporary Austin in Texas). CCA is a community-supported arts center; in addition to films, CCA also hosts events and performances of contemporary chamber music, immersive theater, and contemporary art.

1508 Bishops Lodge Rd, Santa Fe, NM 87506

Situated on eight-and-a-half acres amidst Tesuque’s rolling hills, Finquita is an emerging organization focused on creativity, community, and the vibrant surrounding landscape. “Finquita,” meaning “small farm” in Spanish, blends art and agriculture to offer artist workshops, residencies, and performances, as well as wellness activities, gardening, and a unique venue for events. Once home to the Shidoni Gallery and Sculpture Garden (which closed in 2022), the campus was a fixture of the local arts scene for decades, attracting sculptors from all over the world. Founded in 1971, Shidoni comprised an active bronze foundry, a spacious art gallery built into a sloping hill, and surrounding meadows dotted with outdoor sculptures. Finquita reimagines that industrial and artistic heritage and aims to serve as a community hub, honoring the legacy of its storied spaces while cultivating new ideas.

Finquita’s mission is to harmonize the past and future through one of its core values: “remembering,” which the organization defines as “a process of healing and reconnection that restores wholeness by putting-back-together the pieces of ourselves, our histories, and our relationships.” Finquita aspires to create spaces of reflection and imagination by fostering joy, play, and cooperation.