EXHIBITION EL ZAGUÁN

Christy Hengst

Traces: Known and Un-Known

ARTIST RECEPTION FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 6, 2026 | 5-7 PM | EXHIBITION IS ON VIEW THROUGH SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 28, 2026
AT HSFF’S EL ZAGUÁN, 545 CANYON ROAD, SANTA FE, NEW MEXICO

ARTIST CONVERSATION SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 14 | 2:00 PM – 3:00 PM

Poetry Reading with Henry Shukman: Saturday, November 21 | 2:00 PM – 3:00 PM

Complimentary community programming open to the public. Space is limited, so advance registration is required to guarantee seating.

SIGN UP FOR THE TALK HERE

SIGN UP FOR THE POETRY READING HERE

Historic Santa Fe Foundation Presents Traces: Known and Un-Known, a Solo Exhibition by Christy Hengst

ABOUT THE EXHIBITION

SANTA FE, NM — The Historic Santa Fe Foundation (HSFF) is pleased to present Traces: Known and Un-Known, a solo exhibition of new works by Santa Fe artist Christy Hengst. The exhibition will be on view at The Gallery at El Zaguán, located at 545 Canyon Road, from November 6 through November 28, 2026.

Widely recognized for her public art installations—including public bus stops, sculpted birds in local parks, and creative civic projects—Hengst turns her focus in this exhibition toward archetypal imagery, dreams, and the lingering presence of people and places long past. Traces: Known and Un-Known weaves together diverse media, combining lithography, silkscreened rice paper, text, direct drawing, and the sensuous pairing of fired porcelain and beeswax.

"As I paint, I look for ways to weave meaningful content together with visual decisions," notes Hengst. "Layering images and materials allows for a dreamlike quality and an element of time to slip in. Recently, I've been exploring memory and the lasting influence of things and people long gone. I’ve become more aware of cause and effect: the traces of everything, from physical remnants to memories to the unmeasurable."

She writes, "I’ve been looking at clouds. I swim on my back outside, without goggles, and just look at the clouds. Not in preparation to depict them, but to let myself be influenced by them… absorbing cloudness. Life is mysterious. I hope a person is reminded of that through this work."

The exhibition highlights several distinct series that bring these concepts to life through tangible forms. Delicate porcelain slip-dipped pieces preserved in beeswax stand as physical shells of original objects that burned away during the firing process, leaving behind pure form. A series of triptychs inspired by Hengst's parents bridges the intimate space between personal grief and collective recollection, while her Attic Dream series draws directly from the memory-adjacent collective unconscious. Anchoring these explorations is The Archetypal Grid, which utilizes lithographs as a structural foundation to probe universal images that evoke an instinctive bodily response, inviting viewers to suspend conventional categorization into the known and un-known.

Contact: Anne Kelly at anne@historicsantafe.org or call 505.983.2567 for more information.

©Christy Hengst

Special Exhibition Events at El Zaguán

All events are offered as complimentary community programming at 545 Canyon Road, Santa Fe, NM:

Opening Reception: Friday, November 6 | 5:00 – 7:00 PM
Featuring live acoustic music by Lone Piñon.
Artist Talk – Christy Hengst in Conversation with Carol Andrews: Saturday, November 14 | 2:00 – 3:00 PM
Painter Carol Andrews, who studied at Amherst College, the School of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, and the San Francisco Art Institute, joins Hengst for an in-depth conversation on studio practice, memory, and visual expression. Andrews has painted in rural Northern California for over 30 years and exhibited widely across the U.S. and Brazil (carolandrewsart.com). Advance registration is suggested to guarantee seating.
Poetry Reading with Henry Shukman: Saturday, November 21 | 2:00 – 3:00 PM
An intimate reading by award-winning poet, author, and Zen teacher Henry Shukman. The Spiritual Director Emeritus of Mountain Cloud Zen Center in Santa Fe, Shukman is a teacher in the Sanbo Zen lineage whose poetry has appeared in The New Yorker, The Guardian, and London Review of Books. His background in Zen meditation provides a natural thematic bridge to Hengst's meditative approach to artmaking (henryshukman.com). Advance registration is suggested to guarantee seating.
Closing Party: Saturday, November 28 | 4:00 PM – 6:00 PM
Celebrating the exhibition's conclusion with energetic live music by Samba Fe.

About the Artist:

Christy Hengst’s work ranges from community-oriented public art projects across several countries to intimate studio paintings created in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Shortly after graduating from Amherst College in 1989, Hengst traveled westward to Santa Fe, where she met her future husband and creative collaborator, German blacksmith Helmut Hillenkamp. Together they have collaborated on numerous public and private endeavors.

Hengst's site-specific public art installations include three bus stop shelters in Santa Fe, a collaborative plaza sculpture with a volcano in Ecuador, two Haiku paths, a climate change-focused playground boat, the four-year traveling international installation Birds in the Park, and the clandestine, map-linked project Art in the Loo.

Her paintings layer printmaking, drawing, encaustic, porcelain, and text. They have been exhibited at galleries and museums internationally, including solo shows at Ellsworth Gallery, Box Gallery, and El Zaguán in Santa Fe; the BBK Gallery in Aachen, Germany; the Museum of Modern Art in Cuenca, Ecuador; the Museum of Fine Arts in Las Cruces, NM; and the IX Bienal of Painting in Ecuador. Her creative investigation into present-moment awareness and sensing is deeply informed by a long-term meditation practice.