Written by Dan Mayfield

As the movie industry heats up, it’s common to see familiar Albuquerque faces in the background. But what about art?
Watch the background of the TV shows “Breaking Bad” and “In Plain Sight” for local artists’ work. Weems Art Gallery has started renting art to local movie sets as set dressing.
“They come in and they get a mix of everything,” gallery owner Mary Ann Weems said.
The set dresser, Mary Holyoke, has had to outfit drug dealers’ houses, teachers’ homes and, recently, an entire mall. The film “Observe and Report,” which is filming at the nearly empty Winrock Mall, is using a bunch of art from Weems for a fake mall framing shop.
“I tried to get them to name it Weems,” Weems joked. “The latest one is a real mix because it’s a frame shop gallery in the mall. It was fun because I had a real big picture of my dog Oscar, and she took it.”
Sometimes, the requests are specific.
“We have to do the drug house, and that required expensive-looking art. That has a lot to do with framing. We did the teacher’s house, so we have to have something up, and the teacher is in Albuquerque, so it was more southwestern and traditional,” Weems said.
To the artists, Weems pays a percentage of the rental fee, which can be as much as 10 percent of the cost of the art.
“When I first started noticing art in a TV series was on ‘Frasier.’ OK, this was what was so fun, that was when I was handling Anthony Quinn’s work, and I recognized an Anthony Quinn piece, then they switched it to a (Dale) Chihuly sculpture. They were using real art because Frasier was an art snob,” she said. “Maybe those drug dealers are, too.”
STUDIO DIFFERENT: The new Santa Fe Studios is on its way — but there are still a few minor hurdles for the company to jump before it’s done.
The new studio is a groundbreaking idea, designed to fit in with Santa Fe’s unique attitudes toward buildings and be green at the same time.
Those are often antithetical ideas in filmmaking.
Last week, the Santa Fe County Commission voted to allow the county to sell 65 acres of land to the Hool family of movie maestros.
“There’s a number of additional minor hurdles, nothing too significant,” said Jason Hool, one of the family members working on the studios.
Hool said the big stuff — selling the county on the idea of the studio — is done. And really, how hard could that have been? It looks good, will bring clean jobs, and take over land to the south of town that nobody has wanted.
The little things now, like getting approval for the design and ironing out some other little construction issues, should be handled quickly, and Santa Fe Studios should be open for business by the end of 2009, or early 2010.
And it’s about time.
Albuquerque Studios is swamped. The studio here, in Mesa Del Sol, may be huge but it’s also entirely booked. TV shows, and of course the behemoth project “Terminator IV,” have leased the entire thing.
We do need another studio — and fast — if the state wants to keep up with the film industry that can’t seem to get enough of our landscape and eager film crews.
But studios are big. They’re warehouses on the outside, and all the magic happens on the inside. Usually, not so pretty.
This one should be. It’s designed around the ideas of starchitect Gary Bastien, who drew inspiration from northern New Mexico’s pueblos. Bastien has, for example, designed the studio to run along one of the sun’s meridians, like Chaco Canyon dwellings.
A MARIAH MOMENT:
Superstar singer Mariah Carey quietly slipped in and out of New Mexico in spring 2007. Not long after her record “The Emancipation of Mimi” hit the top of the charts, she filmed “Tennessee” here.
Not to avoid all the “Glitter” bomb jokes, but Carey sparkles in the new film. Folks who saw the movie’s premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York said it was her best acting effort yet. That may not be saying much, but she’s apparently pretty good in it.
The film was shot mostly in Albuquerque and Moriarty.
“Of our 22 days of shooting, three-quarters were in New Mexico,” said Lisa Cortes of Lee Daniels Entertainment.
Though the film was produced by Lee Daniels (“Monster’s Ball,” “The Woodsman”), it’s still considered an indie film because it’s not attached to a major studio.

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