TENDER ALCHEMY: BETH AMES SWARTZ AND JULIANNE SWARTZ Opens At Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art In March 2026

The Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art (SMoCA) will open Tender Alchemy: Beth Ames Swartz and Julianne Swartz on March 21, 2025, presenting an intimate exhibition that unites the work of mother and daughter artists whose practices bridge art, spirituality, and transformation.

This marks the first time their work has been exhibited together, illuminating how two generations approach the concept of artistic “alchemy” through distinct yet resonant methods.

Curated by Lauren R. O’Connell, SMoCA’s curator of contemporary art, the exhibition brings their pieces into dialogue across decades of practice. “Our goal with this exhibition is to create a space where their unique yet harmoniously aligned practices speak across generations,” O’Connell said. “Bringing their works together feels like facilitating an energetic convergence of two artists whose lives and practices have always been intertwined.”

For more than 60 years, Beth Ames Swartz has explored themes of spiritual inquiry and personal evolution through her layered, luminous paintings. Her celebrated “fire work” series from the 1970s and ’80s gained national attention, leading to exhibitions in New York and beyond. Tender Alchemy also features the restaging of her multisensory installation A Moving Point of Balance, shown at 11 institutions from 1985 to 1990 but unseen for over three decades. The installation, which incorporates light, color, and meditation on the body’s chakras, will now feature a new soundtrack composed by her daughter Julianne.

“In a quiet, darkened environment with soothing sound, each participant will make the decision to walk into a colored light-bath and view each visual interpretation of the seven chakras,” Beth explained. “Perhaps this installation was ahead of its time, but now our culture is more open to these esoteric ideas.”

Julianne Swartz’s work engages sound, light, and tactile materials to create multisensory experiences that explore energy, perception, and emotion. Her new and recent sculptures—made from clay, copper, glass, and sound—invite physical and psychological engagement, balancing fragility and strength. “I love beauty and visual form, but that in itself is not enough,” Julianne said. “I want my work to induce awareness, attention, and embodiment in another person.”

The exhibition will also include a survey of Beth’s paintings and mixed-media works spanning more than six decades, tracing her evolution from fire and ash compositions to explorations of mysticism, quantum theory, and holistic philosophy. “Uniting my art is its conceptual inspiration rather than a consistent visual style,” Beth said. “All works are informed by philosophical and spiritual concepts shared by people of different cultural worldviews.”

O’Connell’s accompanying catalog essay contrasts the artists’ approaches: “Beth’s art is maximalist, saturated, and layered with meaning and color, striving toward symbolic depth. Julianne’s work is minimalist, ephemeral, and fragile in its neutrality. One accumulates density; the other cultivates restraint. Yet both share a willingness to surrender control to process, allowing intuition and material to guide them.”

The exhibition reflects SMoCA’s commitment to highlighting Arizona-based artists whose influence extends beyond regional boundaries. O’Connell previously co-curated a major exhibition on Dorothy Fratt, another key figure in the state’s modern art history, noting that “artists like Beth Ames Swartz have profoundly shaped Arizona’s cultural landscape.”

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