Commonly accepted ideas about the American West, both in popular culture and in dominant historical narratives, are often based on a past that never was. They frequently diminish, if not overlook entirely, important viewpoints and experiences. Join Anne Hyland, curatorial assistant and coordinator for the Art Bridges Cohort Program at the Smithsonian American Art Museum, for a lively talk about the exhibition Many Wests: Artists Shape an American Idea. The exhibition, now on view at SAAM, offers counterviews of “the West” through the perspectives of 48 modern and contemporary artists especially those who identify as Asian American, Black, Indigenous, LGBTQ+, and Latinx who offer a broader and more inclusive view of this region. Their artworks question old and sometimes racist clichés, examine tragic and sidelined histories, and illuminate the multiple communities and events that contribute to the past and present of this region of the United States. 

Image: Angel Rodríguez-Díaz, The Protagonist of an Endless Story, 1993, oil on canvas, 72 x 57 7/8 in. (182.9 x 147.0 cm.), Smithsonian American Art Museum, Museum purchase made possible in part by the Smithsonian Latino Initiatives Pool and the Smithsonian Institution Collections Acquisition Program, 1996.19, © 1993, Angel Rodriguez-Diaz