The narrative here has always been driven by nomads and newcomers, people who rolled — or later, flew — across plains and settled into place with open minds and fresh perspectives, inspiring new chapters in the story. That has been especially true over the last century as the population grew, and as photography emerged as an important practice within fine art.

And geography has always been the great, irrepressible motivator of our actions. Our connections to the region’s exaggerated landscape have inspired everything from how our economy developed to how we spend our leisure time. Photographers, endlessly searching for great scenery, have been animated by that backdrop, as well.

“Outside Influences” weaves these ideas together into a show with dozens of photos created from 1945 to 1995 — five crucial decades in American art history — by what can fairly be called Colorado’s most “important” lens-based artists. It is built on exhaustive research undertaken by curator Rupert Jenkins, who will soon publish a book on the same topic.

The show, at DU’s Vicki Myhren Gallery, is an academic lesson, for sure, and one that has never been executed so cohesively. But it is also an adventure, an art star-studded journey through both the local terrain and the minds of people who pushed the discipline forward.

The show’s strength comes from its material, which is organized in a mix of chronology, style and movement. Rather than going year-to-year, Jenkins takes us from interesting moment to interesting moment, letting the dates of each photo fall where they fit best.

That said, it does start in a specific time and place with a section titled “Mid-Century: 1940s–1960s.”  Here, visitors are introduced to the pioneers of regional photography, such as Herbert Bayer, Hal Gould and James O. (Jim) Milmoe.

Bayer’s piece, in particular, sets the exhibition’s tone. Titled “in search of times past,” the 1959 work is an example of Bayer’s photomontage process, for which he cut up existing photos, pieced them back together in provocative ways, and then made a final photo of the reassembled parts.

But what is interesting in the context of this exhibit is the imagery itself, which features the trunks of aspens — the state’s signature tree — integrated with disembodied human eyes. The photo is surreal, no doubt, and not at all logical, but it serves as a swell example of how photographers have used Colorado’s landscape as a starting point but then let their imaginations run wild.

From there, Jenkins tells the tale of this golden age of Colorado photography in groupings of photos connected to themes or to the relationships between photographers themselves.

For example, one section groups together work by Eric Havelock-Bailie, Ruth Thorne-Thomsen and Wes Kennedy, who, Jenkins writes in the accompanying text, made “some of the most resonant, emotionally gripping artwork ever produced by a photographer in Colorado.”

That point is well-made by the dark, death-themed photo collages on display by Kennedy, who made them in 1990 while suffering from HIV complications. They are powerful works, but so are the four portraits of Kennedy hanging right next to them in the show that were taken by Havelock-Bailie just days before Kennedy succumbed to the disease. Death and drama define these works as well.

Meanwhile, Thorne-Thomsen fits into the group because she was a teacher of Kennedy’s at the University of Colorado in Denver. Her photos play heavily with shadow and light — more with shadow, actually — and you can see her influence on the other photographers in the setting.

Other groupings are centered on important periods of time. One calls out “The Denver Salon,” a loose collective of photographers first brought together by Mark Sink in 1993. Sink, who gets his props as “arguably the most influential photographer in Colorado,” organized salon shows in Denver but also in places like New York City and Japan.

The group was known for elevating unusual techniques into the stuff of fine art, including “plastic and pinhole cameras, non-traditional materials, and nascent digital technologies,” and we get to see that in this show, starting with Sink’s own set of “Five Autographed Polaroid Portraits” that he made in the 1980s and through work by Reed Weimer, Eileen Mullin, Joel W. Dallenbach and Jeff Hersch.

“Outside Influences” focuses on the history of photography but it also provides glimpses into the broader narrative of the state and how it has changed over the years, and that will be of great interest to fans of local history.

There are images that cross the line between documentary photography and art. For example, two black-and-white images by Dallenbach — “Graduation at Currigan Hall, Denver” and  “Young Woman at Demonstration” — nostalgically take viewers back to a time when people still used pay phones and public protests meant something, while at the same time capturing both interesting visual geometry and some rich aspects of human experience.

Those photos appear in a section of the exhibition titled “The Social Landscape,” which features photographers whose specialty was freezing moments of upheaval in the Colorado social order, including portrait and street photographers such as Dona Laurita, Mark Kiryuk, Susan R. Goldstein and Gary Isaacs.

There are also a few celebrity-driven moments in the overall exhibition, including John Bonath’s 1981 portrait of Andy Warhol in Fort Collins, and John Schoenwalter’s shot of Allen Ginsberg performing at Denver’s Mercury Cafe in 1982.

As Jenkins points out repeatedly in his text, many of these photographers were not born in Colorado. They moved here to study or teach, or because it was a place of opportunity and renewal. But they mingled, unavoidably, with both the social and creative scene they found here, and with the always-imposing natural environment that surrounded them.

And they made pictures. “Outside Influences” builds a solid argument that there exists a thread that sews the best of their efforts together into a common identity, a shared history. Fortunately, for viewers, it does that job with scores of images that deserve to be looked at well into the future.

Ray Mark Rinaldi is a Denver-based freelance writer who specializes in fine arts.

IF YOU GO

“Outside Influence: Photography in Colorado 1945-1995,” continues through April 27 at the Vicki Myhren Gallery on the DU campus. It’s free. Info: 303-871-3716 or vicki-myhren-gallery.du.edu.

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I make my own list every year, places that seem to be capturing interesting art as it happens, or predicting where it will go next. There are plenty of familiar spaces to see art here, from museums like DAM, the MCA and RedLine, to veteran commercial galleries, like Rule, K Contemporary and Willam Havu. Don’t leave them out of your gallery-going afternoons.

But pay special attention, right now, to the spaces that follow.

Igniting Spark

Spark Gallery has been around for 45 years, and at various locations around the city, but its new location sets it up for a complete renaissance: the artist-run co-op is setting up shop at 1200 Acoma St., directly across from the main entrance of the Denver Art Museum.

That will mean greater visibility for Spark’s members, and for the local art scene in general, which has gotten little serious attention over the past five years from DAM’s globally minded curators.

The new space opens just this weekend, so it remains to be seen how the move will impact shows or sales, or if Spark can use the moment to take it up a notch with its exhibitions. But the gang is kicking off with a broad and promising introduction to the offerings that its hard-working members create. Many of the featured artists are core creatives in this city, including Patricia Aaron, Peter Illig, Mai Wyn Schantz, Sue Simon, Barbara Baer and more.

Next up: The “Inaugural Spark Member Show, Part 1,” starting April 11. Location: 1200 Acoma St. Info: sparkgallery.com

Good Friends

Friend of a Friend gallery occupies a rarified place in the Denver art scene, morphing into something between a project space and a commercial gallery in its latest incarnation, which opened in RiNo last week. It’s stepping out in exceptional form with a group outing featuring three intriguing artists: Rian Kerrane, Aitor Lajarin-Encina and Em Kettner. It’s the show to see right now.

FOF, as it is affectionately called, is a long-term project by artist Derrick Velasquez, who first opened the gallery in 2019 in the former Evans School, sparking a rebirth of the Golden Triangle as a center for local art. For this edition, he has brought in two co-directors, Jenny Nagashima and Ilan Gutin, both with considerable experience as artists and curators. It will interesting to see if the trio can generate the same buzz for RiNo that it did for its old neighborhood.

The gallery has limited hours — for now just Thursdays — so it can be a little hard to access, but it often throws special events, and following it on Instagram will give visitors all the info they need.

Next up: The current show, “Fiction Folly,” continues through April 27. Location: 3575 Chestnut Place. Info: instagram.com/friendofafrienddenver.

Staying Power

Few Denver galleries can match the roster, or the ambition, of David B. Smith in LoDo. The gallery reps both regional and national names, putting on consistently solid exhibitions for local audiences and taking artists to the most important art fairs across the country so they can make sales and build reputations. That’s crucial.

Smith tweaks his roster regularly to keep the energy flowing, but the current lineup of official and related artists is a good example of what the gallery offers, mixing Denver veterans (like Susan Wick) with widely-known contributors (like Justin Favela, who works out of Las Vegas).

Current exhibitions feature two of Colorado’s best painters. Boulder’s Sarah McKenzie takes up the main space with her realist paintings of prisons and museums. The project room, a compact closet gallery in the back, has the enigmatic landscapes of Aitor Lajarin-Encina, who lives and teaches in Fort Collins.

Next up: current shows continue through May 3. Location: 1543 Wazee St. Info: davidbsmithgallery.com

The West, updated

Visions West has a loyal clientele but it gets overlooked as a place to see art in Denver. That’s unfortunate, since it has some of the most compelling exhibits in town, along with one of the most distinct, and likable, personalities.

As its name implies, the gallery features artists from this part of the country, and it is not unusual to see elements of the things that have defined Western art for more than a century now. There a lots of mountains and plenty of cowboys on display.

But this place is not caught up in the past. The work is hyper-contemporary, and its artists are leading the way to new definitions of old genres. The current exhibit, “‘The Love Language of Fire,” is a good example of that. Painter Erika Osborne’s landscapes of charred but reviving forests “explore the evolving relationship between humanity and wildfire.” The work is smart, of-the-moment and, somehow, optimistic.

Next up: Osborne’s show continues through April 18, along with exhibitions by Robin and Robert McCauley. Location: 2605 Walnut St. Info: visionswestcontemporary.com

Expanding roles

The CU Experience Gallery has been around for a while now (it used to be called the Next Stage Gallery) but it seems to have found its voice lately, transforming into one of the more interesting places to take in art in Denver. The space is a collaborative venture between the University of Colorado Denver and the city’s department of Arts & Venues.

Experience Gallery makes the most of its location, in the plaza of the Denver Performing Arts Complex downtown, which means it has a steady audience of theater and classical music goers who can avail themselves of its offerings before they attend concerts and plays. A stop here nicely rounds out a night at the theater.

But the work is not to be taken merely as an appetizer. It is, by and large, provocative and challenging and built off strong curatorial themes. Recent shows have featured such artists as sculptor Katie Caron, filmmaker David Liban and the digital art explorers taking part in the city’s annual Digerati Emergent Media Festival. It’s unpredictable, in a good way.

Next up: The group show “Two Sides, One Coin,” exploring the coexistence of darkness and light, runs April 24 to May 18. Location: Denver Performing Arts Complex. Info: cudenverexpgallery.org.

The standard bearer

I update this list every year, but Robischon Gallery is always on it. The place has been around for nearly five decades and it has been a leader — maybe the leader — in local art for all that time. Here is why: It has the right combination of great art and good shows.

Robischon represents the top tier of Colorado artists — folks like Stacey Steers, Stephen Batura, Derrick Velasquez and Trine Bumiller — and is the local rep for national names, like Kiki Smith and Ann Hamilton.

That gives it a lot to work with when putting on exhibits for the public in its LoDo headquarters. Under the hand of gallery co-director Jennifer Doran, the offerings come together under cohesive themes and take on the quality of museum shows. You heard me say all this before, but Robischon deserves the nod, again.

Next up: Four solo shows start April 24: Barbara Takenaga, Linda Fleming, Terry Maker and Ana Maria Hernando. Location: 1740 Wazee St. Info: robischongallery.com.

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And it is fair to say that most of them are more deluxe than “Colorado Perspectives: Visions in Photography,” the exhibition organized by the city’s Department of Arts & Venues. The show has limited signage to help visitors understand the works and a very loose curatorial aim of demonstrating the “diverse range of artistic visions, compelling compositions and mastery of craft” being produced by photographers around the state. This is a sprawling show with dozens of pictures.

Most challenging of all is the venue, the cavernous third floor of the McNichol’s Building in Civic Center. A former Carnegie library that has been converted into city offices and large event venues, McNichols is, no doubt, an important architectural treasure. But it is a disastrous place to show art. The ceilings are too high, the lighting is impossible to control and the walls are interrupted by windows, columns and emergency exits. It is difficult to get into the groove of any exhibition produced there.

And yet, “Colorado Perspectives” has exactly that — a good rhythm that pulls visitors into the pulse of fine art photography and the dance that shooters do to capture familiar places from innovative vantage points. Colorado viewers will recognize many scenes depicted in the show, but they will feel different.

One clear example: Armando Martinez’s “Dealer Flower,” which captures the cars parked in an auto dealer’s sales lot — but from above, using a camera attached to a drone. From the ground, the scene would look like an ordinary dealership with the products positioned in a way that shows off their best assets to potential buyers. But from above, the cars come together to take the shape of a flower, with petals shooting out from the center in perfect, 360-degree precision.

That is one type of perspective show organizer Michael Chavez was going for when he assembled this exhibit of work by Colorado photographers. He also gives us glimpses of nature, people, buildings and urban street corners that are equally unexpected.

“Colorado Perspectives” is very good at showing what can make a photograph a work of art rather than a document of facts. The images here are not meant to show the state’s natural grandeur, its towering mountains or its big skies. There is nothing resembling the hugely popular landscape scenes shot by the late legend John Fielder.

Instead, we get Lakewood photographer Matthew Steaffens’s unique take on the annual “Stockshow Ride,” where cowboys of every stripe parade through downtown Denver saddled up on their prized livestock. Steaffens gives us a horse-eye view of the moment, pulling the attention off the event’s pageantry and focusing his lens on the countenance of one fancy horse. If animals have souls, this photo aims to prove it by inviting us to experience the parade through the eyes of a wordless participant.

It is hard work to make a photo like that — it takes patience, a keen eye and an open visual mind — and the exhibit is defined by such extreme efforts. Photographer Susan Artaechevarria, who lives in Center, spends long hours in rural Colorado looking for interesting takes on natural vistas, sometimes in the dead of winter.

Her image, titled “Fox in Snow,” is one of the show’s best. It depicts a lone fox standing in a flat field covered in snow. The background is relentlessly white, and it is hard make out anything in this picture beyond the silhouette of the fox. But it gets at both the vastness of the terrain and the difficult conditions that wildlife experiences here. It resists uplifting nature and focuses on the workmanship required for simply being a fox.

“Colorado Perspectives” has plenty of variety, both in subject matter and in photo processes. There are giclée prints, archival digital prints, inkjet prints and more in the mix. Many of the photos are straightforward images, others can go far into abstraction. Sometimes, they are too much of a mystery since there is minimal information available to know where a shot was taken or when.

Despite that free-wheeling nature, it comes together cohesively and, I have to say, enjoyably. Part of that comes from a high-level of talent throughout the presenters. They are all members of the nonprofit Colorado Photographic Arts Center — these are the hardworking image-makers who take their craft seriously, usually in the name of art, rather than any financial profit.

But it also recognizes the depth of beauty and wonder that exists here — if you look. It encourages us to see beyond the obvious, larger-than-life attributes that make Colorado so famously attractive to both residents and outsiders. It cuts through the challenges of bad lighting and awkward emergency exits and asks us to focus on small things rather than big things. It is inspiring.

“Colorado Perspectives: Visions in Photography,” continues through July 9 at the McNichols building in Civic Center. It’s free. More info: mcnicholsbuilding.com.

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As befits the title of the mural, “Catalysts” features an overlapping display of 35 unsung local arts-and-culture heroes. But the reasons why they were chosen — and the fact that Denver recruited the world-renowned artist behind the cover of The Beatles’ 1967 album “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” — is unusual even in the realm of giant bear sculptures, red-eyed horses, and other major pieces.

“Denver has made exceptional use of their natural resources, if you will, in the public art scene, and other cities should be jealous,” said Jann Haworth, the 83-year-old creator of “Catalysts.” “The Denver mural is in its own kind of camp from my (other work). It’s community-generated. It’s workshop-generated.

“And the problem of a portrait is the most difficult thing you can do in fine art,” she added. “It isn’t necessarily an accurate photographic portrait of someone. It’s just a joyous piece of art.”

The three-paneled “Catalysts” features stenciled portraits of behind-the-scenes arts drivers “who are integral to the success and vibrancy of Denver arts and culture,” according to a statement. That ranges from maintenance staff at venues to nonprofit leaders, dancers and writers (read about each one at catalystsproject.com/honorees). They hail from groups such as Art from Ashes, Union Hall, Japanese Arts Network, Wonderbound, Youth on Record and many others.

Its three 26-by-24-foot panels are viewable on the side of the Buell Theatre, on Champa Street between 13th and 14th streets. Crews finished installing the mural this month, with a formal unveiling on March 14. But unlike some public art pieces, it’s temporary and scheduled to come down in two years.

“When talking with Jann we realized a lot of synergy between her practice and highlighting underserved organizations and individuals,” said Annie Geimer, a curator and leader of the Denver Theatre District’s special projects, which span 16 blocks in downtown Denver. “I loved her women’s mural in Utah and thought, ‘Why don’t we expand on that project?’ ”

The stenciled and colored portraits in “Catalysts” recall Haworth’s “Sgt. Pepper’s” style, but necessarily widen the subjects. She takes her depictions seriously, having completed Salt Lake City’s “Work in Progress” mural that includes 250 women integral to the history of the town where Haworth currently lives.

As a British-American Pop Art pioneer, Haworth emerged from England’s early-1960s art scene and has for decades put herself at the intersection of art and politics. Her feminist themes, exploration of “soft sculpture” (sewn and fiber materials), and willingness to reinvent herself has led to hundreds of installations and shows worldwide, including simultaneous shows in the U.S. and Europe.

“It’s an honor to reflect certain things that really need saying, and this is a public platform to do that,” Haworth said, referring to the top-to-bottom efforts at arts nonprofits. “Sometimes you feel like your other work is not as out there as a mural on a wall that lots and lots of people are going past.”

Haworth sees her piece as overlapping with street art, and Denver’s history with the medium — from groundbreaking Latino artists to festivals such as Denver Walls — as uniquely indicative of it. It’s ever-evolving, just like the art scene, Geimer said.

“If you view it as a sample or a mid-way report on what’s going on, there’s always more to be said,” she noted of “Catalysts.” “We were really intentional about who we reached out to, these people doing behind-the-scenes work that allows organizations to function — volunteers, security guards, cooks. It recognizes the people who take extra time and dedication to help these groups.”

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That’s part of the intention of these so-called “immersive” art installations – to transport guests to another world using all the senses. But Meow Wolf management is keenly aware that some guests may feel overwhelmed by the sights, sounds and tactile sensations.

In 2023, the company achieved Certified Autism Center status at each of its locations by completing a certification process and training with the International Board of Credentialing and Continuing Education Standards (IBCCES). Meow Wolf sought this certification to ensure the exhibits are welcoming and accessible to everyone, said Melissa Gassien, director of operations for Denver’s Convergence Station.

“As we learn and grow and understand more about the accessibility needs of travelers, we keep adapting and growing to make sure we’re providing the best experience possible,” she said. “There’s so much new technology and unique apps and things just that make it easy to provide that experience to everyone.”

Part of the process involved training Meow Wolf employees on how to identify and interact with autistic individuals and other guests who may be experiencing overstimulation. Techniques include watching for people covering their ears, finding spaces to talk where no one is shouting over the house audio, letting visitors drive conversations about their comfort levels, and accommodating guests with tools like noise reduction headphones, sunglasses and sensory toys.

The training was geared toward individuals with intellectual disabilities, though some of the skills would apply to working with folks who may be intoxicated and overstimulated. It’s no secret that Meow Wolf is one of the trippiest places in Denver, and it hosts numerous psychedelic events, including the upcoming acid-inspired Bicycle Day celebration in April.

The company doesn’t condone drug use at its facilities, but security teams are prepared to de-escalate situations where people might be overwhelmed, Gassien said.

“This is absolutely where our security team would come in and just have conversations. Just kind of say, ‘Where are you at? How can we help make sure you have water, that you have a place to sit down? … How can we help facilitate that you’re comfortable?’” she said.

There are also specific rooms within Meow Wolf’s exhibits that offer calmer and quieter environments, some with no background noise at all. In Denver’s Convergence Station, Gassien points to the Blue Sound Spa in the Ossuary, which features blue tile from floor to ceiling and a soothing audio soundtrack. There is also a guest services lounge on the first floor where staff can escort people who need to decompress (it doubles as a room for breastfeeding).

Expect “white walls, some plants in there, a couch, kind of more of a calming space that just is like, OK, this is going to remind you of your living room,” Gassien said.

Convergence Station inhabits a massive 90,000 square feet across multiple floors. So if someone needs a break from the stimuli quickly, they can find a stairwell as a last resort.

“If you need an instant kind of take out of world, the stairwells are a little more of a visually muted space, but there is still light audio in there,” Gassien said.

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The curator spent years honing her concept and fine-tuning her roster, bringing together the work of 31 artists across multiple disciplines to demonstrate the idea that darkness is a very underrated aspect of our universe. There is beauty in blackness, this exhibition argues, value in places that lack light.

Instead of fearing dark places — the night sky, the deepest parts the ocean, shadowy street corners — we should understand the role that darkness plays in nurturing our existence.

But the world changed as this show came together, or at least it started to feel that way for many people. A coincidence of wars, political upheaval, an environmental crisis and lingering PTSD from a global pandemic pushed our collective psyche into a place somewhere between fear and panic. Across social and geographic divisions, there is a prevailing sense we are living through a difficult episode in world history.

And that gives “Dazzle of Darkness” a different — and more urgent — context. It’s a show that explores darkness as we experience a dark time. It invites us to dwell in the moment, to really feel it.

But, also — and this is the good news — to try to appreciate it. Life begins in the dark, with a seed underground, with a baby in a womb, and this show reminds us that good and worthy things arise when things are at their dimmest. It’s a dose of badly needed optimism.

DiDomenico looks at this idea through a number of seemingly diverse artworks that all link to this same idea.

Some of the objects are quite simple in presence, among them Patrick Marold’s “Black Pillar,” a 4-foot-tall floor sculpture that consists of a large column of wood, cut from a single tree that appears to be burnt on all sides. It’s a charcoal black monolith.

But Marold has shaped it so that it twists gently as it rises from the ground, and he exposes the natural cracks of the wood — and those moves allow the pillar to reflect light and cast shadows in ways that emphasize the tree’s complicated grain and growth structure, one of those miracles of nature that often go unseen. Instead of ruining the tree’s allure, it unveils its inner beauty.

The unique, reflective quality of black powers other pieces in the show. Jerry Wingren’s “Resting Stones” is three polished, black rocks on a pile of black sand. The different shapes and textures of the work catch the light in varying ways — emphasizing both positive and negative space — turning the piece into a meditation on stillness and presence, and how our own bodies and souls occupy the planet.

Ana Maria Hernando’s “Hortensia” is an oil-on-canvas still life depicting a bouquet of hydrangeas rendered in only blacks and deep grays, the way we might see these flowers if we encounter them after sundown when there is little light to help us sort out the visual details. She is not just painting flowers here but also the time of day; it’s a portrait of nighttime itself and full of subtle complexity. “Darkness invites us to embrace the inherent, if latent, light that resides in blackness,” she writes in her artist’s statement.

Other works seek to render the nighttime sky and the things that light it up. Babak Tafreshi’s “Fireflies of the Great Smoky” is a long-exposure video that captures the neon green trails of fireflies as they flitter through a dark forest.

Brian Barber’s “When Stars Came to Earth” captures the configuration of stars in the dense sky in a glass sculpture meant to reflect “the spiritual and mythic significance of the stars within Native American culture,” as the exhibition catalog puts it. (The piece broke in transit, but you can see its intention in the shards of glass on display.)

There are more high-concept takes on the beauty and mystery of darkness. One good example: the three ceramic pots on display by ceramist Toshiko Takaezu. The clay here is produced in a number of rich colors, with shades of blue, pink and yellow.

But the pots have very small openings at the top, pinholes really, and Takaezu, who died in 2011, wanted viewers to see the clay pots less as objects themselves and more as frames for what is inside them — which is nothing. She was “sculpting the darkness within,” as the catalog suggests. A viewer cannot actually see it, but it is there, contained, and meant to be contemplated.

“Dazzle of Darkness” is a departure for BMoCA. The entire gallery is painted black, both the walls and the columns, giving the show an immersive feel. It’s sort of like entering a fish tank with lots of bright, glowy things to swim through.

It also successfully merges the work of national art figures with artists whose careers are rooted locally. Among the more widely known names are Tony Oursler, Swoon and Cannupa Hanska Luger. They join artists who have defined the Colorado art scene for decades, including Mark Sink, Clark Richert, Stacey Steers, Martha Russo, Terry Maker and Kim Dickey.

It’s an all-star lineup, no matter how you look at it. And in the dark space of BMoCA’s back galleries, every participant shines bright.

IF YOU GO

“Dazzle of Darkness” continues through May 4 at the Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art, 1750 13th St., Boulder. Info: 303-443-2122 or bmoca.org.

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It’s not a conspiracy theory to say AI could replace many real photographers, especially those in the commercial realm, in a matter of years. It has already started.

At the same time, the Colorado Photographic Arts Center has been their best friend. The Denver-based non-profit has spent 62 years doing everything in its power to elevate the images that photographers make, staging countless exhibitions, public events and educational programs to enhance public understanding and appreciation of what the organization’s very existence argues is an essential art form.

That makes CPAC’s current exhibition a curious, and certainly controversial, outing. “History Reimagined” features three photographers whose work is generated exclusively by artificial intelligence. No use of actual mechanical cameras, no photo shoots in perfectly lit studios or on busy urban streets or in war zones, no sitting of subjects or framing of scenes.

Clearly, curator Samantha Johnston, who also happens to be CPAC’s executive director, is playing the traitor here by engaging with artists whose main tools are prompts, entered into programs, which generate images based on billions of data sets stored digitally around the globe.

These artists don’t point and shoot; they sit and type. They are anti-photographers, at least in the making of the work now on display at CPAC. They don’t belong here.

But this risky move has a significant reward. It is one of the most thoughtful and timely exhibits that CPAC has ever done. Print by print, it is a wildly captivating showcase of groundbreaking art.

Johnston knew she would take some heat, and made some wise advance moves to head off criticism and open up minds. In her curator’s statement, she notes how the show respects CPAC’s foundational mission to “acknowledge and respond to the technological innovations that are transforming the medium.”

She has a point there. CPAC guided the photo-loving public through the transition from analog to digital photography, the last revolution that altered how we see and respond to image-making. It is the institution’s responsibility to explore what comes next.

She also built her roster around three people who have demonstrated real skills with actual cameras. Todd Dobbs, Laura Rautjoki and Phillip Toledano are all accomplished in traditional photography techniques. That gives them at least some cred with the photo crowd.

Most importantly, she found good products to show off as examples of AI’s abilities. The images in this show do not just mimic actual photos; they do so with finesse and a deep understanding of what makes a quality photo connect to the human spirit as well.

That is to say, they do not look fake. Nor do they look hyper-real. Viewers cannot easily brush them off as follies and are forced to confront them as qualified competitors to traditional photos. The enemy is well-armed, and it’s got skills.

Within that, these artists deploy a lot of imagination and exploration. They each have their own motivation for making fakes, and each challenges the usual boundaries placed around art-making. This work engages a fundamental question: Is creating visual images through AI an extension of photography, or is it a whole new art form?

In some ways, these images feel very much like the contemporary art we see now in galleries and museums, with artists exploring topics of politics, media, racial bias and exploration of personal identity. They are trendy that way.

For example, the pieces from Rautjoki’s “The Image of a Woman” series look at the way females have been presented in art and media in her home country of Finland — mostly by male artists, filmmakers and photographers — and how that impacts her own ideas of self.

Her tactic is to replace the male gaze with data-driven images prompted by a female artist and produced by AI. Because the data set that AI uses includes historical photos, journalistic products and things like selfies, Rautjoki’s images alter the usual gender biases.

Within that new reality, she ventures far into the surreal, generating work of full-blown, often eerie, fantasy. Some of these objects explore the past and some feel super present, and many are quite funny. But she manages to make things that demonstrate, as she says in her statement, “the same quiet, ordinary, and unpretentious atmosphere that has characterized my previous work as a photographic artist.”

Fiction drives the work of Toledano, whose “Another America” series rewrites the history of mid-20th century New York City. His question: If it is becoming impossible to know if a photo is telling the truth, why not create a truth of your own — and make it more interesting than what really happened?

So he prompts AI to visualize his fantasies. One photo shows a giant sinkhole taking out a large section of street in Manhattan, which would have been a calamitous event — if it had actually happened. Another shows wolves roaming the streets of the city, while another depicts a massive urban flood. Some of the photos are accompanied by not-true stories penned by writer John Kenney.

Toledano’s photos demonstrate the power of AI to create fantastical pictures and its capacity to make them feel ultra-real — but also its dangers in allowing users to manipulate memory with deftness.

Dobbs’ work has the most critical take on AI’s abilities. To create his images, he prompted his computer to produce a “photograph of a typical American,” and it gladly offered up scores of scenes of human figures decked out in red, white and blue, often to ridiculous extremes.

The photos document one of AI’s biggest problems: “Despite running the same prompt countless times, the resulting images are uniformly American, white, and suburban — a visual echo of dominant cultural norms,” as the curator’s segment sums it up. Dobbs’ point is that AI is only as good as the data it knows, and oftentimes that data is lacking.

But Dobbs’ work does not come off as such a simple question-and-answer. It contains a deeper discussion about patriotism, consumerism and the nuances of personal and national identity. It condemns AI but at the same time honors it by understanding its power to both reflect and drive the cultural conversation.

That same idea overrides the exhibition as a whole. AI is here, and it is something to fear. It may be the source of our extermination, but can it make us more thoughtful and creative humans as we head out the door?

IF YOU GO

“History Reimagined” continues through April 12 at CPAC, 1200 Lincoln St. It’s free. Info: 303-837-1341 or cpacphoto.org.

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The 400-square-foot building, sandwiched between two brick houses, was a two-chair barbershop in the early 1930s, with the Cassady family crammed into a lean-to on the back. There, young Cassady — future spark of Jack Kerouac’s “On the Road,” and the Beat Generation’s 1950s and ’60s movement at large — pretended to sail the seas with his sister, or played Col. and Mrs. Lindbergh in the plucky Spirit of St. Louis, as Cassady wrote in his 1971 memoir, “The First Third.”

Now the building will join the scant commercial storefronts along that stretch of Champa (including the popular Curtis Park Deli) as a gelato shop called Cassadys. It comes courtesy of John Hayden and Keith Pryor, who own another shop, Thick’s Gelato and Chocolates, about a mile away at 3339 N. Downing St.

Metro-area natives Hayden and Pryor, who moved into the neighborhood in 1995, were drawn to the structure, which had sat boarded up for decades and had been listed as one of Denver’s “neglected and derelict buildings” since 1999.

“It was such a cute, strange little shop, just attached to the side of this house. We thought that if we could ever save that little building, we would love to,” Hayden said.

Despite him only living there a year, Cassady’s connections to the building are far from tenuous. He and his mother Maude moved across the street to a boarding house known as The Snowden in 1933, after his father (also named Neal) left the family.

“Neal described the tenants as jazz musicians and prostitutes, and a few pious women with children, like his mother,” said Hayden, also a Curtis Park and Five Points realtor who gives Beat history tours of the area.

“… They rocked the joint night and day, for the place had a noise mania,” Cassady wrote. “The air seemed always filled with assorted yelping catcalls, shouted curses, frightened screams and, topping all in my mind, those exciting feminine whoops of laughter. There was hardly a moment that something untoward wasn’t happening… ”

The Snowden is gone now, having been replaced by a condo development at 2563 Champa St. That makes the former barbershop across the road an even more vital connection to Cassady’s youth.

The chance to take it over arrived via Hayden’s client Sean Bennet, who bought the tiny space and the house next door. Hayden, and Pryor, a contractor, snatched up 2558 Champa St. for $150,000 about five years ago. The pandemic slowed their plans to revitalize it, but they’ve recently sped up after investing another $70,000 for a new roof, a shored-up eastern wall, a tiny patio (where the Cassady family’s lean-to sat), and mechanical upgrades to save the sinking floor due to a major water leak.

A handsome, aqua-tile wall with Art Deco shapes now adds depth to the back, while brass fixtures and a pair of skylights will spread natural light more evenly.

Cassadys won’t just offer a tiny retail counter of sweet treats. Hayden and Pryor have been in touch with Cassady’s middle child, Jami Cassady Rato, who’s given them her blessing to use the family name, as she told The Denver Post in an interview. Hayden and Pryor are already planning to sell Beat memorabilia alongside gelato, such as iconic Beat books and poetry, art and photos.

They also hope to hang portraits of Beat writers such as Allen Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac, and William S. Burroughs on the bare walls — painted by Cassady’s wife, Carolyn, who attended art classes at the University of Denver — and eventually shepherd the collection into a prominent local art museum.

Much of their Beat knowledge comes from Mark Bliesner, a Denver historian who for years organized the annual Neal Cassady Birthday Bash, as well as conversations with the Cassady family. There’s a trove of lesser-known books that shed more light on the legends, Hayden said. Neal’s wife Carolyn wrote one called “Off the Road,” which offers a woman’s perspective on a largely male cultural movement — and which is often not flattering to Cassady or Kerouac.

Still, Cassadys gelato shop will be a celebration of Neal’s life, Hayden and Pryor said, however tightly laid out. Out back, a fence will soon hug the tiny porch where visitors will still be able to see the lines on the brick where the lean-to’s roof was formerly affixed. They were inspired to use the space more efficiently after a recent trip to Vietnam, Hayden said.

While most of the neighborhood dates back to the 1880s, the houses that surround the Cassadys space were built in the 1920s, in the familiar Denver Square style that at the time was a departure from the Victorian mansions in the area — many of which later turned into boarding houses.

Cassadys’ location suggests high visibility and foot traffic, with people streaming back and forth from Welton Street — along the Five Points neighborhood corridor — to a busy stretch of Larimer Street in the River North Art District.

“We have a separate fortune from downtown,” Hayden said when asked about the business troubles just a mile to the west. “We need a vibrant downtown, but our ecosystem is separate, and we’ve performed better despite downtown’s recent woes.”

“This space really reflects Denver in terms of our boom and bust economies,” Pryor said. “You repurpose and use spaces based on which cycle you’re in. That’s very Denver, and this is ground zero for how that occurred.”

Even demo’ing the space, which Pryor did as a general contractor, reveals a lot about Denvr’s evolution, dredging up piles of decades-old newspapers and generations of random tchotchkes and signs of domestic life.

“In other cities, little bitty spaces like this are usually in commercial districts,” Hayden said. “But this is a very mixed spot, to this day, with Curtis Park Deli, low-income apartments, intact grand mansions, million-dollar townhomes, artists studios and single-family dwellings all sharing the same space.”

Cassadys owners hope their shop will be humming along by 2026, which coincides with what would have been Cassady’s 100th birthday.

“Neal was so influential, and the way he spoke and wrote was influenced by growing up in Five Points and being around a diversity of people and cultures,” Hayden said. “He had friends who were Mexican and Asian and African-American all living together in that community, and that wouldn’t have existed if he had grown up anywhere else. That makes this a passion for us, not just a gelato shop.”

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Williams spends long hours pondering questions like that. And some others: How do fish communicate within schools? How do birds read each other’s minds and avoid crashes on long, migratory journeys? How do trees discuss the weather?

These are scientific questions, and the artist has worked closely with zoologists, marine biologists and astronomers doing research. But Williams also takes an artist’s license to concoct the fantastical answers that are reflected in the paintings, sculptures and installations in this show.

Willams’ works do explain natural phenomena but they go beyond fact and into a dream-like place that suggests a larger web of dialogue exists among natural objects, and between non-human objects and humans. Can a snake chat with a flower? Can a seed pod correspond with a volcano? How do boulders express their autobiographies to geologists?

The DBG show, “Language Without Words,” pulls together several bodies of work that Willams has made recently, and they take various forms.

Some feel like interactive exhibits in a science museum, aiming to teach children about the planet. “Alphabet of Stones,” for example, is a set of black, ceramic rocks set up in a row on top of a white table. Visitors are instructed to pick up a rock and see what is underneath. The tiny, hidden objects that are revealed give clues about historic periods of biodiversity and mass extinction. It’s a bit of school, but it is fun to play along.

Other objects in the exhibit take the form of more traditional paintings hung on the wall. For works like “Bird Language (Murmuration),” Williams presents a series of images in oil of both the sky and flocks of birds flying through it. The artist organizes the painted images into grids that create a sort of code that explores how the migratory birds take their formations over large bodies of water and through stormy skies.

A similarly organized work, “Dreams of an Orange Fruit Dove,” is a grid of animal-like things such as snakes, beetles and human eyes integrated with geological features like mountains and plants. The works are mysterious, surreal in a way, and they invite viewers — indirectly — to contemplate connections between the inhabitants of the planet and beyond.

In that way, the works cross a daring line. As a culture, we tend to keep scientific facts separate from the fantasies of artists — it is how we know the real from the unreal, and how we order the universe. But Williams’ work suggests that you need both the scientific data and a bit of imagination to fully grasp how the natural world operates — or at least use that to open yourself up the the possibilities.

It is a hybrid practice that has earned Williams exhibitions at straightforward art sites, like Denver’s Museum of Contemporary Art and K Contemporary gallery (which represents Williams) and more matter-of-fact institutions, such as the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder and the New York Hall of Science in Queens.

The most prominent works in the DBG show also cut across the usual categories of visual arts. There are both traditional sculptures and paintings on display, but also a series of works that combine the two forms into something that is hard to name.

Works like “Cloud Shadow and Cloud Specimen,” for example, are made up of both colorful paintings hung on the walls and three-dimensional clay pieces that sit on shelves directly in front of them. In this case, that means a two-dimensional painting of blueish blob of nebula rendered in oil and gauche in the background, and a clay, cloud-shaped sculpture on the shelf before it. The piece, in its way, connects the psychic dots between actual clouds and the whimsical ideas we have about their shapes and movements.

The connections get more abstract than that. Consider: “Leaf and Blushing Tree,” “Blue Rock and Small Planet,” “Cactus and Mushrooms” or “Lightning and Cloud.” There are dozens of these works that mix diverse elements of a painting and a sculpture into one cohesive and indivisible work of art.

They can be very science-minded. One work sets a painting of a school of fish behind a ceramic piece shaped into a reef. The pieces explain how fish have sensory powers that allow them to move gracefully in large groups.

Or they can be very science-fiction-like. “Squid and Moon,” for example, which has a yellow-green painting of a squid, set before a small, ceramic moon, looks like something off of a low-budget, space-epic movie set. Other objects have spines, spindles, thorns, tails and teeth. They are based in nature, but they have personalties that range from comical to creepy.

In that way, it is a very entertaining show, and for a wide audience. Williams has real skills, especially with a paintbrush, demonstrating precision but also a light and imaginative touch. But the artist also has a sense of humor and wonder, a curiosity that is appealing and informative, but not overly instructive.

Mostly, the show is a journey into the mind of a non-traditional scientist who just wants us to think about the things we can understand about the natural world and what might yet is to be understood.

IF YOU GO

“Language Without Words” continues through May 4 at the Denver Botanic Gardens, 1007 York St. Info at 720-865-3500 or botanicgardens.org.

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“Denver has an extraordinary commitment to arts and culture with that (model), and the investments of SCFD are core to our survival,” said Meghan McNamara, executive director of Levitt Pavilion Denver, which offers 50 free, high-quality concerts each summer. “The impact goes beyond what’s on our stage, because there’s a great opportunity at this moment to tap into mental health support, workforce development and community outreach.”

That’s a common kudo for the SCFD, since no other metro area can boast of a similar tax-for-arts program. The one-penny-for-every-$10 in sales-and-use tax collected for SCFD adds up to survival for Front Range culture and arts — itself now receding at the federal level in the last few weeks.

Promoting a civilized society is more important than ever, said Deborah Jordy, SCFD’s executive director for the last decade. This month, Jordy updated scfd.org to include a flat-footed reminder that SCFD does not receive federal funding, and is therefore not subject to the whims of budget cuts, threats, or heavy-handed directives on who and what it can fund.

Diversity, equity and inclusion is still very much central to its mission, she said. But Jordy will step down this summer after leading SCFD through the pandemic — arguably the biggest crisis since its 1989 inception — and winning praise from nonprofits ranging from Cleo Parker Robinson Dance to History Colorado.

Benefits are immediate

SCFD is the only cultural tax district in the United States that includes more than one county. But there’s never been any guarantee that it would survive its three-plus decades in Colorado, let alone thrive, as it has over the last five years.

SCFD’s benefits are immediate; it sponsors free days at marquee attractions such as Denver Botanic Gardens and Denver Art Museum, which are always packed as a result, and cultural events across the region. But it also stabilizes organizations in the midst of growth.

“I think we’re a little behind some of our peers in the seven-county metro area, but we’re getting there,” said Hassan Najjar, former executive director of Golden’s Foothills Art Center, just after he reopened the historic Astor House after a $4.1 million renovation last summer.

“But we have a mix of funding,” he said. “We get a little chunk from SCFD, but we also have our foundations, private donations and a pretty good mix of earned revenue (from classes and events). It’s a really good ratio that helps protect us from things like pandemic shutdowns.”

Najjar has since left for Delaware’s Biggs Museum of American Art, but his time in Colorado showed him the central role of SCFD in the arts scene.

And yet, SCFD could have tanked if it had it taken a revenue plunge during the pandemic — as most arts nonprofits and businesses did after closing to the public for up to two years.

A voter-authorized fund that comes up for renewal every few years — most recently in 2016, and next on the ballot in 2028 — SCFD remains a lifeline for artists and creatives fighting for money and attention. Since 2020, tax receipts from the seven-county metro area served by SCFD — Adams, Arapahoe, Boulder, Broomfield, Denver, Douglas and Jefferson (with the exception of Castle Rock and Larkspur in Douglas County) — have grown year-over-year due to robust, if surprising, revenue from increased spending.

“There was pent-up demand, and a lot of it was shopping,” Jordy said. “It was redoing your kitchen and your bathroom. It was creating a home office and buying new furniture, and keeping kids happy at home with arts and science projects,” she said. “Trying to create a little joy in our homes trickled down to people spending money on things.”

Doing a lot with a little

Given its scope and mission, SCFD has accomplished a lot with a $1.5 million annual budget and a full-time staff of seven, board members said.

“It is difficult to overstate the impact that Deborah has had on arts and culture in our region and beyond,” said Denver City Councilwoman Jamie Torres, vice chair of the SCFD’s board of directors, in a statement. “While her daily leadership presence will be hard to replace, we look forward to keeping her on board to provide the advice and counsel that only she can.” (Jordy will assume an advisory role after stepping down this summer.)

SCFD’s first distribution totaled just $14 million. As recently as 2016, boosters and legislators lobbied for its reauthorization, and Torres noted it deals not with “the partisan passion of the presidential race, the economic effects of minimum wage, or the tendentious traits of universal health care or right to die. It’s only about culture!”

SCFD’s biggest member organizations, also known as Tier 1 recipients, get the lion’s share of funding — or about $50.3 million last year, representing 64% of the total. It makes sense, since they also draw the most visitors and revenue. The Denver Zoo Conservation Alliance and Denver Museum of Nature & Science, for example, netted more than $12 million each, according to SCFD filings.

Funds pointedly cannot be used for construction projects, endowments, debt reduction or redistribution to smaller organizations. Rather, they’re meant to keep both costs and ticket prices low — or free, as the case may be — by bolstering programming and supporting education and diversity programs at schools and on stages.

Jordy’s job for the last few years hasn’t just been about collecting and distributing money. It has involved constant efforts to educate people on SCFD’s importance. The next executive director, who’s not yet been chosen, will have to tackle all of that — as well as reauthorizing the special tax district when it comes up for renewal three years from now.

“I’m kind of like the SCFD police,” Jordy said with a laugh. “There are people who will have a say in funding in the future who are just moving to Denver now and have no idea what SCFD is. Our job is to change that, and to encourage (nonprofits) to help their patrons understand our importance. I kindly call them up and say, ‘Can you please make sure you mention us in your program or speech? It’s not for us, it’s for you and the community to know your own value.’ ”

Challenges ahead

The Front Range’s population growth has also lately been stilted, with more people leaving, say, Boulder County than moving in, and deaths are expected to exceed birth rates statewide by 2050. Housing is unaffordable for many, and new construction can be seen as an obstacle by existing residents in cities such as Littleton, creating disagreements about growth.

All of that directly affects SCFD’s receipts.

“Colorado’s population, which averaged annual gains of around 76,000 a year in the last decade, has grown less than half as fast this decade,” The Denver Post reported in November. “Demographically speaking, the state looks like it has peaked, and what is ahead will be much different than what is behind.”

Jordy’s confident the new SCFD director will be able to confront the numerous challenges, especially as she moves into a senior advisory role on June 30. Her successor will also need to be “an exceptional listener,” she said.

A longtime artist, curator and former director of the Colorado Business Committee for the Arts, Arvada Center for the Arts and Humanities and others, Jordy has cemented a pace, tone and team at SCFD that will outlast her tenure. For that, she’s roundly beloved in the metro area.

“If you are working in the arts and culture arena in the Denver metro area, you know Deborah, have been mentored by Deborah or directly benefit from work Deborah has done,” said Jacki Cooper Melmed, chair of the SCFD board of directors, in a statement. “Her stewardship of the SCFD is just one more example of the impact she has had on arts and culture for nearly 50 years.”

“I’ve tried very hard to be available, even giving out my cellphone number to anyone who wanted it,” she said. “I want people to understand and trust what we do. I want to simplify the application process and timing. I want people to know we can’t go to foundations or individuals to ask for money, because we’re guided by law.

“I also want everyone to know I’m there for them, because the way I did this job was about trust,” she added. “We need to build and maintain that with the public, because that’s how we survive. We’re public servants, and should never forget that.”

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