Spring 2026

The Lara-Soto Adobe is one of 20 historic buildings featured in the new field guide. Isabel Hunter’s 1928 painting of the adobe will hang in the MMA exhibit in May. Artwork: Courtesy of Paula and Terry Trotter, Trotter Galleries SHORT CUTS LIT 78 C A R M E L M A G A Z I N E • S P R I N G 2 0 2 6 A new book, “Preserving History: A Field Guide to Art and Architecture in Monterey” leads readers to 20 buildings of historical significance in that multicultural cross- roads. Three collaborators, scholar and writer Cynthia Wagner Weick, writer and editor Amelia Ward and artist and gallerist Joaquin Turner, coauthored the piece. Each building profile is paired with artwork from the early to mid-1900s. “I gained a greater appreciation for just how long the history of Monterey is,” Weick says. She says it all began with the Coastal Native Americans who built renewable villag- es of “ruks,” of branches and reeds. “When no longer needed, they burned them,” she adds. Under Spanish colonial settlement, things became more permanent. The book begins with the town’s oldest structure, the 1795 Spanish Colonial Royal Presidio Chapel, and ends with the 1926 El Estero Presbyterian Church. Support for the project came from the Monterey Museum of Art (MMA), the Marcia F. DeVoe Fund and the Old Monterey Foundation. The guide will be unveiled at an event on April 30 at Irvine Auditorium in Monterey and will be available at MMA, the Carmel Art Association and local independent booksellers. A related art exhibition will begin at MMA on May 7. For more information, contact Cynthia Wagner Weick at cwagnerweick@gmail.com. Tr io Publishes Field Guide to Monterey Ar t and Architectural Histor y B Y M I CHA E L CHAT F I E LD