Mixed Media SITE Santa Fe’s 20th-anniversary birthday bash

SITE Santa Fe (1606 Paseo de Peralta, 505-989-1199) is celebrating its 20-year anniversary, but the contemporary-art venue isn’t expecting any china. Instead, SITE is inviting you to a party. Its eighthour community birthday celebration takes place on Saturday, May 9, from noon until sundown, with hands-on activities, live performances, food, and art. Events include Sewing Circle, a workshop from noon to 3 p.m. led by visiting artist Marie Watt, whose artwork will be on exhibit in SITE’s upcoming July exhibit. Also from noon to 3 p.m., artist Jason Middlebrook, whose work appeared in last year’s Unsettled

Landscapes exhibit, presents a birdhouse-making workshop in conjunction with his ongoing project Your General Store ,a mobile store currently located in back of SITE that operates on a barter system. Rose B. Simpson and Los Angeles street artist Breeze collaborate on a lowrider painting demonstration using a 1968 Chevy Impala as their canvas. Simpson, whose work is in 20 Years/20 Shows: Spring, will lead an apocalyptic fashion parade in her souped-up, black-on-black pottery-themed lowrider, Maria, at 3 p.m. There is music by DJ Yon and a live performance by Afro, pop, and funk band Jaka. SITE guides are also on hand to lead tours through the exhibits. All community birthday events are free.

Visitors can also view SITE’s current exhibition 20 Years/20 Shows: Spring through May, as well as a special benefit art exhibit and sale, Double Vision, which opens Friday, May 8, at 5 p.m. with a free preview reception. Reserve a space by calling SITE. Two works each from 10 artists, including Thomas Ashcraft, Paul Sarkisian, Joanne Lefrak, and Erika Wanenmacher, are in the exhibit, and sales benefit SITE Santa Fe. The show remains on view through Sunday, May 10. What’s Inside, an exhibit of young artists’ work curated by SITE Santa Fe’s Young Curators, opens with a free reception following the birthday bash at 6 p.m. on Saturday, May 9. The Young Curators is an after-school program for high-school students, who learn all aspects of mounting a museum exhibition, including marketing and fundraising, and choosing and installing works. What’s Inside features a selection of pieces from 15 artists between the ages of sixteen and twenty-four. This is the first time the Young Curators exhibit is mounted inside SITE Santa Fe. The show is on view through May. Chelsea Garcia: Losing Clarity ,2015, archival pigment prints; above, photo of Rose B. Simpson’s lowrider, Maria, 2014