Shakespeare on the town

In 1623, when Santa Fe was still in its infancy, two actors in London who had worked with William Shakespeare in the theater company known as the King’s Men compiled 36 of their late colleague’s plays and had them published in an oversize volume that has since become known as the First Folio. A rare original copy of the First Folio, on tour from the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, D.C., will be displayed at the New Mexico Museum of Art beginning Friday, Feb. 5, supplemented by an abundance of ancillary exhibitions and public programs around town. On the cover is a painting of the playwright — known as the Cobbe portrait — thought to be the only portrait of Shakespeare painted in his lifetime.