Both the New Mexico Museum of Art and SITE Santa Fe announced this week that they’ve been awarded Museums for America grants from the Institute of Museum and Library Services. The downtown art museum stands to receive $250,000 while the Railyard-based contemporary arts space will pick up $131,800.
“We are so honored to receive this critical support and endorsement from IMLS which will empower our staff and Board of Directors to address our core values of being in an organization that is committed to diversity, equity, accessibility and inclusion,” says SITE’s Philips Executive Director Louis Grachos in a statement. “These funds ensure that we can advance our work in this area.”
Meanwhile, at the Museum of Art, Executive Director Mark White says in a statement that the institution is “pleased and honored to have received such a significant grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services. Stewardship of the collections is one of the primary responsibilities of any museum, and this grant will provide much needed financial support for collections storage and cataloging as we prepare to open the New Mexico Museum of Art Vladem Contemporary.”
The forthcoming Vladem Contemporary satellite wing of the Museum of Art has, of course, been embroiled in a bit of a public image dispute of late with activist groups like Keep Santa Fe Multicultural and others deriding the state’s Department of Cultural Affairs’ decision to tear down a mural by the artist Gilberto Guzman (and others) titled “Multi-Cultural.” Just last week, a federal judge denied the department’s request to dismiss a lawsuit from Guzman seeking to preserve the mural.
SITE Santa Fe is not facing any controversies as far as SFR knows.
The Institute of Museum and Library Services has also awarded numerous other grants to nearby institutions this year, including $50,000 to the Wheelwright Museum of the American Indian as well as several $10,000 grants to library systems on Native land, including at Pojoaque Pueblo and Santa Clara Pueblo. A full list of New Mexico IMLS recipients can be found here. In 2020, IMLS awarded over $280 million to museums and libraries across the country.