E Pluribus Unum: El Norte is a mobile black and white photography studio, a mobile public exhibition, a book, and later a museum exhibition. Axle Contemporary is a mobile art gallery and for this project also serves as a natural-light photography studio. During the late summer and Fall of 2022, the studio/gallery will visit communities in Northern New Mexico, offering free photographic portrait sessions to all. We will set up at local businesses, schools, cafes, roadsides, festivals and other community gathering places.

In each portrait, the subject/participant holds a small object, brought with her/him that holds some personal significance. Each object reveals something about the identity of that individual, and anchors the photograph in a specific time and place.

Two copies of each photograph are printed immediately onsite in our solar-powered print studio. One is given, free of charge, to the participant. The other is pasted to the exterior of the studio/gallery, creating a growing mobile public exhibition. As the exterior is slowly covered in photographs, awareness and enthusiasm for the project expands for all passersby.

E Pluribus Unum: El Norte is the fifth in our series of E Pluribus Unum (EPU) portrait projects in New Mexico. Past EPU projects took place in Santa Fe (2012), Albuquerque (2014), on and adjacent to the Navajo Nation (2016), and in Southeastern New Mexico (2018). As we visit more regions of the state, we bring to light the distinct cultures and traditions of New Mexico, share visions of the compelling contemporary individuals that make up this place, and also share a vision of our shared humanity and our strength as communities.

About the artist: Housed in the back of a custom retrofitted 1970 aluminum stepvan, Axle Contemporary is an art gallery on wheels. We exhibit installation art, performance, works on paper, including photography, drawing, and painting, and occasionally sculpture. Our mobility allows us to visit both typical art venues and unusual ones, such as schools, empty lots, restaurants, grocery stores, and city streets.

Our 6' x 10' exhibition space features high wood ceilings, exposed beams, track lighting and a magnetically based system for displaying unframed works on paper. 

Axle Contemporary was founded in 2010 by artists Matthew Chase-Daniel and Jerry Wellman, as a collaborative work of art, and an innovative vehicle for arts distribution.  It has since grown beyond the confines of the mobile exhibition space, and also includes book publishing, and alternative methods of creation and dissemination of contemporary arts in the public sphere.  Axle Contemporary is supported in part by Axle Projects, Inc, a 501 (c)(3) corporation , which is made possible by your donations.