By Kevin Hendricks, The Paper.
New Mexico’s rivers, lakes and irrigation ditches get the elegy-and-love-letter treatment next month, when Wild Hearts Gallery in Placitas opens an exhibit built from wax, pigment and photographs of water that may not always be there.
“The River Runs Through Me,” featuring photo encaustic work by artist Dana Patterson Roth, runs Aug. 4-30 at the gallery, 221-B State Highway 165. Roth builds each piece by layering hot beeswax and pigment over her own photographs of New Mexico waterways, then scraping some areas back and building others up to reshape what the camera caught.
Roth has spent years photographing the state’s ditches, lakes and rivers, drawn to the calm they offer even as long-term drought shrinks them. The gallery’s release frames the show as a way to mark both the comfort those waters have given and the loss now underway as they dry.
The public can meet Roth twice during the run: an Aug. 8 demonstration (11 a.m.-1 p.m.) where she’ll work wax onto a photograph live, and an Aug. 15 opening reception (1-3 p.m.) with refreshments. Wild Hearts Gallery is a collective of 14 local artists, open Tuesday-Friday 10 a.m.-4 p.m. and Saturday-Sunday 10 a.m.-2 p.m.
“The River Runs Through Me”
Wild Hearts Gallery, 221-B State Highway 165, Placitas
Exhibit: Aug. 4-30, 2026
Artist demonstration: Aug. 8, 11 a.m.-1 p.m.
Artist reception: Aug. 15, 1-3 p.m.
Info: wildheartsgallery.com | 505-361-2710