The sacred architecture of northern New Mexico – second set: the churches of the High Desert
We will start this set on the “High Road” from Santa Fe to Taos, a scenic byway through the Sangre de Cristo Mountains. This is a fantastic drive winding through high desert, mountains, forests, small farms, and sleepy little Spanish land grant villages and Native American pueblos, with many adobe churches and most importantly the Santuario de Chimayó (more below) along the way.
First, Sacred Heart (Sagrado Corazón) Catholic Church in Nambé Pueblo.
Next, a group of photos in this set all taken at the pilgrimage site of El Santuariò de Chimayó (the Shrine of Chimayó) called “the Lourdes of America”. Read more here and here. This was a special stop. I got there on a Sunday as mass was starting. No photography was allowed within the church; the one interior shot is at a chapel near the church (there are a couple of small chapels nearby). The walls in the small village were adorned with sacred art (in a very un-touristy way). Notice the baby shoes on the wall in the interior picture in one of the chapels.
The very small and basic church after that is in remote Truchas on the high road. (Film trivia note: much of The Milagro Beanfield War (1988) was filmed on location in Truchas.) The final church on the high road is San José de Gracia Church in the 18th century village of Las Trampas.
The more modern church in the set is in Taos which I photographed at the end of a long driving day (with a lot of stops) on the high road from Santa Fe.
Not too much rest for your photographer, however: the next morning (after watching the Oscars with friends from California now living in Taos) I got an early start to do a shoot in the soft morning light at the historic (and iconic) San Francisco de Asis (Saint Francis of Assisi) Mission Church on the plaza of the Ranchos de Taos Historic District near Taos. Ansel Adams photographed San Francisco de Asis; Georgia O’Keeffe painted it. O’Keeffe called it “one of the most beautiful buildings left in the United States by the early Spaniards.” (Read more here and here.) This unique adobe church was built between 1772 and 1816. Residents of Ranchos de Taos (and others) gather together every spring to re-plaster the church.
The light was simply wonderful – that New Mexican high desert light I had heard so much about. There was some cloudiness (especially some darker clouds at the back of the church) with the sun periodically breaking through behind me and illuminating the crosses and the front of the church. (That night the snow started again – those clouds were telling me something…) The plaza was utterly deserted on this very cold February morning. Even though this has been called the most photographed church in the USA and draws many visitors, not that cold morning in late February: I was completely alone. A man and his cameras. The whole photo shoot was just magical. In my Taos set (coming soon) I will include a few of these in color, too. My only regret was that the interior of the church was not yet open. I will definitely be back to Taos, however, and will view it then.
The final two churches of the high desert in this set are little Our Lady of Sorrows Church, Arroyo Hondo, near Taos, built in 1892 and recently restored (shown to me by my Berkeley friends Janaki and Hari on an amazing High Desert drive with them – thank you again!), and, on the Low Road out of Taos after my stay there, the humble mission church in Velarde, the Iglesia de la Virgen de Guadalupe (the Church of the Virgin of Gaudalupe), 1817, with the beautiful angel statues on the tombstones, and the simple, weathered wooden cross, in front.
The sacred architecture of the High Desert. Sublime. Unforgettable.
