VB Price

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Name V.B. Price Role Poet		Spouse Rini Price (m. 1969) Siblings Victoria Price

Parents Vincent Price, Edith Barrett Grandparents Vincent Leonard Price, Sr., Marguerite Cobb Wilcox Books The Orphaned Land: Ne, A City at the End of the World, The oddity, Broken and Reset, Chaco trilogy Nationality American Born 30 August 1940 (age 83) Los Angeles, California, U.S. Education University of New Mexico (B.A., 1962) Genre Poetry, journalism Subject Human rights, environment, architecture Years active 1962–present Children 2 Relatives Victoria Price (half-sister) Similar Tom Andrews (poet), Elia Abu Madi, Elizabeth Arnold (poet)

Interview author v b price 2011 10 28

Vincent Barrett "V.B." Price (born August 30, 1940) is an American poet, human rights and environmental columnist, editor, journalist, architectural critic, novelist and teacher. He is co-founder of New Mexico Mercury, an online platform featuring news, commentary and analysis from a variety of experts and writers around New Mexico. Price is an emeritus lecturer in the University of New Mexico's Honors College, where he has taught since 1986 and at UNM's School of Architecture and Planning. He teaches ancient Greek and Roman literature in translation, modern poetry, urban studies, and New Mexico environmental studies.

V.B. Price, poet

Biography

Price was born on August 30, 1940 in Los Angeles, California, the only son of actor Vincent Price (1911–1993) and his first wife, actress Edith Barrett (1907–1977). He graduated from the University of New Mexico in 1962 with a B.A. in anthropology. In 1969 Price married the artist Rini.

Writing

He has been writing in New Mexico for over 53 years. Price's poetry and prose has been published in more than 70 national and international publications since 1962. He was the architecture editor for Artspace Magazine of Albuquerque and Los Angeles, and the former editor of New Mexico Magazine. Price was the city editor for the New Mexico Independent (print publication) and worked for the publication through the 1970s. He was the founding editor of Century Magazine, which ran from 1980–1983. He was architecture critic at the Albuquerque Journal in the mid 1980s. He wrote for the Albuquerque Tribune from 1978 till the paper closed in 2008, most notably as a weekly columnist. Price was an editorial contributor to the New Mexico Independent (online publication) from 2008-2009.

From 2004 to 2012, he served as the series editor for the Mary Burritt Poetry Series at the University of New Mexico Press. In his role as an editor, he facilitated the publication of works from over 500 authors, poets, and scholars based in New Mexico.

In November 2011, UNM Press published Price's latest book, The Orphaned Land: New Mexico's Environment Since the Manhattan Project. In the book, Price analyzes fifty years of newspaper articles and government reports to reveal the environmental toll which New Mexico has paid for decades of military munitions testing, uranium mining, and population growth: unsustainable development, air and water pollution by multinational corporations and undue strain on the state's limited water supply, to name a few. Framing New Mexico as, "a microcosm of global ecological degradation," Price explores the impacts and systematic breaches of public trust by some of the pervading power structures affecting the environment around the world: the military-industrial complex, multinational corporation's impact on local natural resources, and the lack of consideration of long-term environmental consequences in development planning. Speaking with Gene Grant on KNME's, New Mexico In Focus, Price states that the Manhattan Project both transformed and deformed the American West. It elevated New Mexico into one of the intellectual and scientific epicenters for the Cold War, but it also resulted in 2,100 waste sites at Los Alamos National Laboratories in Northern New Mexico and 400 waste sites at Sandia National Laboratories in Albuquerque. Marc Simmons of the Santa Fe New Mexican calls the book, "a stellar compendium focused on the state's slide toward ecological degradation."

Recognition

2016 – Honorary Degree, Doctor of Letters (Litt. D.), University of New Mexico

2016 – Paul Bartlett Ré Peace Prize of the University of New Mexico, Lifetime Achievement Award

2014 – Top of the Rockies Award, First Place, Environmental Enterprise Reporting Online

2006 – Bravo Award for Excellence in Literary Arts from the Arts Alliance.

2004 – Price's book, Albuquerque: A City At The End of the World, won the Fray Francisco Atanasio Dominguez Award for Historic Survey and *Research.

2003 – Citizen Planner of the Year award by the American Planning Association of New *Mexico.

2002 – Erna Furgusson Award, UNM Alumni, "for touching the minds of many and for service the University of New Mexico and to the greater community."

1999 – Humanist of the Year Award by the Humanist Society of New Mexico.

1996 – ACLU-NM First Amendment Award for excellence in journalism.

1989 – Friend of the Environment Award by the New Mexico Conservation Voters Alliance.

1989 – UNM Centennial Distinguished Alumni award.

1985 – Governor's Award for Historic Preservation in New Mexico.

1984 – Award of Merit from the New Mexico Society of Architects for architectural criticism.

1975 – Governor's Cultural Properties Review Committee's award for his, "penetrating provocative editorials in defense of New Mexico's cultural environment."

Books

The Cyclops Garden (1969), San Marcos Press

Semblances (1976), Sunstone Press

Monsters, with Vincent Price (1982), Groset and Dunlap

Chaco Body (1992), Photographs by Kirk Gittings, Artspace Press

Albuquerque: A City at the End of the World (1995, 2003), UNM Press

Anasazi Architecture and American Design (1996), co-edited with Baker Morrow, UNM Press

The 7 Deadly Sins (1997), La Alameda Press

Chaco Trilogy (1998), La Alameda Press

The Oddity (2004), UNM Press

Myth Waking: Homeric Hymns: A Modern Sequel (2004) St. Elizabeth Street Press, Brooklyn

In Company: An Anthology of New Mexico Poetry Since 1960 (2004), (co-editor), UNM Press

Canyon Gardens: The Ancient Pueblo Landscape of the American Southwest (2006), Edited by V.B. Price and Baker Morrow, UNM Press

Broken and Reset: Selected Poems 1966–2006 (2007), UNM Press

The University of New Mexico (2010), UNM Press

The Orphaned Land: New Mexico's Environment Since the Manhattan Project (2011), Photographs by Nell Farrell, UNM Press

ROME MMI, Poems by V.B. Price and Photographs by Jan Schmitz, printed on demand

Television

In the 1989 opening episode of KNME's Colores series, Price interviews Godfrey Reggio about the film Koyaanisqatsi.

In a 1993 episode of KNME's Colores series, Price reads from his book, Albuquerque: A City at the End of the World, and expands on the past, present and future of the city in videotaped interviews.

In October 2011, Price was interviewed by Gene Grant for the KNME produced New Mexico In Focus. The interview revolved around Price's recently published book, The Orphaned Land: New Mexico's Environment Since the Manhattan Project.

Poetry readings

In March 2010, Price was videotaped while reading from a variety of his published and unpublished poems at Acequia Booksellers in Albuquerque's North Valley.

Personal life

Price was born in Los Angeles but has lived in Albuquerque's North Valley for over 47 years. He has been married to artist Rini Price since 1969 and the two have collaborated since the early 1970s with Rini creating artwork for the majority of Price's books of poetry. The Prices have two sons, Jody Price of Santa Fe, NM, and Keir Price of Kinnelon, NJ and two grandchildren, Ryan Price and Talia Price.

References

V.B. Price Wikipedia

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