As winter turns to spring, explore these artful events happening throughout and beyond the West.
Through February 28
Mitch Epstein: Property Rights
In a series never shown before in a U.S. museum, pioneering color photographer Mitch Epstein confronts urgent contemporary issues through 22 compelling large-format photographs, offering viewers a new way to consider attention-grabbing headlines. Traveling the country between 2017 and 2019, Epstein captured images from Standing Rock protests to the Arizona and Texas borderlands, where public and private rights are often in conflict. Challenge your perceptions and see modern history through the lens of this internationally renowned artist. Amon Carter Museum, Fort Worth, Texas, 817.738.1333
Through March 28
Honky Tonk: Portraits of Country Music, 1972 – 1981
Renowned photographer Henry Horenstein’s portraits capture the essence of the honky-tonk scene — its stars, its fans, and its venues. Covering everything and everyone from Nashville’s Tootsies Orchid Lounge and the Grand Ole Opry to Dolly Parton, Doc Watson, Loretta Lynn, and Del McCoury, Horenstein takes the viewer back to the 1970s for a behind-the-scenes look. A supplementary display related to honky-tonk music, including A Selection of Hard Rock’s Country Music Memorabilia, will be included with the exhibit. The Birthplace of Country Music Museum, Bristol, Virginia-Tennessee, 423.573.1927
Through April 25
Hard Twist: Western Ranch Women — Photographs by Barbara Van Cleve
Part of the Eiteljorg Museum’s 2020 – 2021 theme Honoring Women, this exhibition of renowned photographer Barbara Van Cleve’s work comprises 62 documentary-style black-and-white photographs of a group of women who work around cattle and horses and compete in rodeos. Subjects include rancher and champion cutting-horse rider Fern Sawyer; as well as Ruby Gobble and Gretchen Sammis, who worked together for nearly 50 years at the Chase Ranch in New Mexico; and world champion bareback bronc and bull rider Jan Youren. These women plus 25 other ranch women counter the stereotype that all ranchers and ranch hands are men. The photographs are published in a book by the same title. Eiteljorg Museum, Indianapolis, 317.636.9378
February 27 – April 4
Masters of the American West
One of the country’s premier Western art shows, this annual fine-art exhibition and sale kicks off February 27 with an award presentation and the opening of the Miniatures online sale. Festivities culminate with a hybrid event March 13, when paintings, sculptures, and mixed-media pieces by more than 60 top Western artists — such as Len Chmiel, Tammy Garcia, Mark Maggiori, Grant Redden, and Kim Wiggins — will be sold by random drawing. Artwork can be viewed online February 27 – April 11; the physical exhibit is slated to be up February 27 – April 4. Autry Museum of the West, Los Angeles, 323.667.2000
February 18 – June 19
The Last Glacier
As part of The Last Glacier collective — begun in 2010 in response to the rapidly retreating glaciers in Montana’s Glacier National Park — artists Todd Anderson, Bruce Crownover, and Ian van Coller spent four years hiking the park to visit the last glacier in the “crown jewel of the continent.” This exhibition comprises their resulting photographs, reductive woodcuts, paintings, and limited-edition book that serves as a historical document of climate change in the park. For more information on the collective’s work worldwide, visit thelastglacier.com. Hockaday Museum of Art, Kalispell, Montana, 406.755.5268
February 24 – 28
American Indian Art Show and Tribal & Textile Art Show
View the virtual editions of two unique San Francisco shows online. The 37th annual American Indian Art Show features antique American Indian art, pre-Columbian, Spanish colonial, and contemporary American Indian art. Items include jewelry, textiles, baskets, pottery, beadwork, sculpture, paintings, photography, books, and more. The 35th annual San Francisco Tribal and Textile Art Show offers museum-quality objects and artifacts from tribal cultures and Indigenous peoples of the Americas, Asia, Oceania, Polynesia, Africa, and the Middle East. Objects of Art Shows
March 1 – 5
Borrego Plein Air Invitational
Fifteen artists, working in oil, watercolor, pastel, and acrylic, will fan out over the Borrego Springs area to capture the beauty of its desert landscape, flora, and fauna. Artworks hang in the Borrego Art Institute Gallery through March 28. Borrego Art Institute, Borrego Springs, California, 760.767.5152
March 1 – June 30
Music for the Great Sun
This first major collaborative exhibit of First American artists Marcus Amerman (Choctaw) and Preston Singletary (Tlinglit) celebrates a largely overlooked civilization. The two artists have joined forces to create glasswork by Singletary with designs created by Amerman, influenced by the forms and symbols of the ancient mound-building cultures of North America. The exhibit name derives from The Great Sun, a divine god-king of the Cahokia Moundbuilders, of which Amerman is a descendant. Exhibit C Gallery, Oklahoma City, 405.767.8900
March 6 – 7
Heard Guild Indian Fair & Market
Top American Indian artists present their artwork at this annual event, the second largest market of its kind in the nation. This year will feature the same quality authentic, handmade work by jewelers, bead workers, potters, katsina doll carvers, basket artists, painters, sculptors, and weavers in a virtual art market with a live juried competition and virtual and live show and sale of juried competition entries. Heard Museum, Phoenix, 602.252.8840
March 6 – April 18
Western Spirit Art Show and Sale
This annual juried art show and sale comprises 230 pieces of premier Western art from roughly 110 artists, plus miniatures. Artwork is available for viewing and purchase online. A members-only limited-access opening reception on March 6 includes the Vandeward Miniature Art exhibit. Cheyenne Frontier Days Old West Museum, Cheyenne, Wyoming, 307.778.7289
March 15 – May 22
American Plains Artists (APA) Signature Show & Sale
This annual event features realistic and representational artworks by APA signature members depicting life on the American Great Plains in historical as well as present times. Meet the artists at an opening reception March 15. Petrified Wood & Art Gallery, Ogallala, Nebraska, 308.284.9996
March 27
Night of Artists Exhibition & Sale
For the first time in its history, this event will comprise both in-person and online festivities, offering more than 300 new artworks including paintings, sculptures, and mixed media by more than 75 of the nation’s leading contemporary Western artists. Giving ticketholders an advantage to purchase the art first, an online auction kicks things off March 13. Then a virtual annual Collectors Summit leads up to the 20th Anniversary Celebration of Night of Artists Exhibition and Grand Live Auction on March 27. The public exhibition and sale runs March 28 – May 9. Briscoe Western Art Museum, San Antonio, 210.299.4499
April 3 – July 25
Ansel Adams in Our Time
More than 100 of Adams’ most iconic photographs are displayed alongside works by 19th-century photographers as well as contemporary successors whose modern-day environmental concerns point directly to his legacy. The exhibition offers visitors a deeper perspective on themes central to Adams’ practice, demonstrates the power of his legacy, and sparks conversation about the state of the American landscape today. Portland Art Museum, Portland, Oregon, 503.226.2811