The Santa Fe and Taos Colonies: Age of the Muses, 1900–1942

During the first half of this century, Santa Fe and Taos became havens for artistic émigrés fleeing America's machine-age culture. The elements of the Southwest scorned by an urban-industrial nation—awesome vistas, intense light, and isolation—drew such notables as D. H. Lawrence and Georgia O'Keefe.

These aesthetes succeeded where speculators had failed—they made the Southwest attractive to the outside world. Their lives and works contradicted the conventional image of the Southwest as a cultural desert. They became citizens of their communities and precipitated a renaissance in Indian and Hispanic art. When federal policy forbade indigenous lifestyles, religion, and art in an attempt to Anglicize the Indians, the artists and writers of northern New Mexico not only challenged these policies but began to incorporate "primitive" elements into their own works and to encourage Indian artists.

This is the story of the golden age of Santa Fe and Taos, from 1900 to 1942—the Age of the Muses. It is the story of Mary Austin, known as "God's motherin-law," and of Mabel Dodge Luhan, Taos "salon-keeper" who helped shape the colonies. And it is the story of the many artists—painters, writers, sculptors, architects, and musicians—that helped create the artistic aura that exists in northern New Mexico today.