Lensic Performing Arts Center
Enriching our community through performing arts and education
The Lensic Performing Arts Center is Santa Fe’s year-round home for the performing arts. Our mission is to enrich lives by bringing diverse art and people together in the historic Lensic Theater, a cornerstone of downtown Santa Fe since 1931. The Lensic Performing Arts Center is New Mexico’s largest performing arts education provider, reaching 13,000 students annually. The Lensic also programs events throughout New Mexico as Lensic 360, including 50+ free events with the annual Santa Fe Summer Scene program.
The Lensic's Summer Scene is now in its third year. This programming significantly adds to the unparalleled arts and culture offerings in Santa Fe, a small city with less than 90,000 people that truly punches above its weight. It was not always the case, as Lensic 360 Director, Jamie Lenfestey recalls:
“I was walking through the Railyard on a night where there was a show there and on the Plaza as well. I walked past a couple and overheard the woman exclaim, 'I can’t believe how much is going on in this town!' I stopped in my tracks, turned back, and said, 'I have been waiting 20 years for someone to say that!'"
Summer Scene has grown enormously through the years, bringing an extraordinary vibrancy to this unique community that connects us with friends, neighbors, and visitors alike, through our shared love of music and our beautiful City Different.
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The Santa Fe Community Foundation invited local nonprofits to submit stories related to our July topic of Arts & Culture.
Wheelwright Museum of the American Indian
Last year, the Wheelwright Museum of the American Indian opened Carved Stories by Hopi artist Mavasta Honyouti. Featuring all sixteen low-relief carvings from the Coming Home series — created in tandem with Honyouti’s children’s book Coming Home: A Hopi Resistance Story — the exhibit recounts his grandfather Clyde Honyouti’s experience at an off-reservation federal boarding school. This Indigenous-led project offers a powerful and visually compelling reflection on Hopi life, culture, and history. As Brian Vallo notes, “Carved Stories… is both powerful and beautiful.”
Kha'p'o Community School
With support from the Native American Advised Fund, sixth-grade students at Kha’p’o Community School embarked on Our Voice, Our Stories — a year-long documentary project blending traditional Tewa arts and modern digital storytelling. Through pottery, weaving, sewing, and film, students explored their cultural identity and celebrated their voices as young Tewa people.
Truchas Services Center Preschool
The Truchas Services Center Preschool serves children from all the surrounding communities, providing supervision and appropriate curriculum for children ages 3 to 5 years old. The mission of the Pre-School program is "Children learning through playing".
