Tuesday, October 16, 2012

NM archaeological treasures find new home

State archaeologists and some of the artifacts — from chipped stone and pottery to blankets and human remains — they have collected over almost a century soon will be reunited in a new building west of Santa Fe. The Center for New Mexico Archaeology, west of N.M. 599 on Caja del Rio Road, plans to hold an open house on Saturday, Oct. 20. The 34,000-square-foot, single-story, modern-looking, energy- and water-efficient building will house the 33 New Mexico Archaeological Studies employees as well as 10 million artifacts held by the state Museum of Indian Arts and Culture. Don’t expect to find regular exhibits at the new center. That sort of activity is prohibited in the deal through which the state obtained the land from the U.S. Bureau of Land Management. Don’t expect to find regular exhibits at the new center. That sort of activity is prohibited in the deal through which the state obtained the land from the U.S. Bureau of Land Management. But Eric Blinman, director of the Office of Archaeological Studies, doesn’t want the center to be seen as elitist. “It is a public facility,” he said. “People can come in. It’s obviously more convenient if they have an appointment. We can hold educational programs. We can have tours. We can hold workshops, training sessions. We just can’t have exhibitions for which we sell tickets. … If we wanted a museum in the technical sense, the land would cost us half the appraised value. As it is, with our current use, the land has cost us $520.” The Office of Archaeological Studies began in the late 1920s as an arm of the then-private institution known as the Laboratory of Anthropology. The lab eventually was absorbed into the Museum of Indian Arts & Culture, but its building on Museum Hill continues to be known by the same name. It was the first home to the New Mexico Office of Archaeological Studies — a state agency charged, beginning about 1954, with investigating and documenting potentially significant cultural sites on state land and, via contracts, on federal, other governmental and private lands in anthropologically rich New Mexico...more

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