Selections from The Las Vegas Project: Contemporary Life on the Historic Santa Fe Trail in New Mexico, 2021

This documentary project commemorates the 200-year anniversary of the Santa Fe Trail in New Mexico, an important 19th century wagon route that brought settlers and commerce to the American Southwest. It connected the region’s Native and Spanish cultures with the American east coast and Europe. During the spring break of 2021, I led a class of eight master students from Florida in capturing the stories of the places and people of this unique American region in black and white film and digital photographs, illustrating the culture, heritage, and historical roots that go back hundreds of years. Between 2022 and 2024, the exhibition traveled in New Mexico, including extended showings at New Mexico Highlands University in Las Vegas and Santa Fe Community College. The 52-print archival exhibition with bilingual oral histories will be permanently installed at the historic Castaneda Hotel in Las Vegas across from the train station where two east and west bound trains still stop daily.