¡Colores!; Los Escondidos

KNME-TV (Television station : Albuquerque, N.M.) · May 5, 2001

Most have heard of the Cinco Pinturas; five artists with studios on Canyon Road in Santa Fe during the middle of the last century. Their lives and work were and still are celebrated. There are however, many artists who lived and worked in SF for longer, who did not receive recognition, but are every bit as important. Los Escondidos, the unsung champions of Hispanic art, profiles three Hispanic artists who have worked in relative obscurity while keeping their artistic heritage alive. Eliseo Rodriguez is a Native of SF New Mexico who has lived and worked on Canyon Road his whole life. He is an accomplished painter but it is his work in creating straw art that has made him a guardian of this traditional Hispanic art form. Beautiful, intricate yet simple, Eliseo's straw art harkens back to a time when canyon road was an agriculture district, not the "adobe Disneyland" many locals feel SF has become. Ernesto Martinez has worked at the historic La Fonda Hotel in SF for almost 45 years, A native New Mexican, Ernest has spent his entire adult life creating original art in and for a hotel that, largely thanks to him, is a living, working museum. Abad Lucero has kept the art of traditional furniture making alive for well over half a century. Through his simple yet classic workmanship, he has made furniture as singular and beautiful as the culture he wants to preserve. Los Escondidos features interviews with acclaimed New Mexico sculptor Luis Tapia, muralist and fresco artist Frederico M. Vigil, traditional furniture maker and designer Chris Sandoval and the curator of contemporary Hispanic and Latino Collections at the Museum of International Folk Art, Tey Marianna Nunn, Ph.D.. Funded in Part by New Mexico Arts.