The artwork on view at the American Museum of Western Art represents a cross section of paintings that survey the art of the American West from the early 19th century through the age of industrialization. During the relatively short period of history illustrated by this collection, the West was transformed from Indian territory unknown to most inhabitants of the eastern United States into a settled region. Within only 90 years after the Louisiana Purchase, the “Old West” of Indian buffalo hunters, mountain men, pioneers, gold-seekers, and open-range cowboys had passed into history. Prior to its installation in the Navarre building in 1999, selections from The Anschutz Collection were widely exhibited throughout the United States and were also shown in Canada (Calgary), in Europe (Helsinki, Brussels, Munich, London, Paris, and Vienna), in the People’s Republic of China (Beijing and Shanghai), and in the former Soviet Union (Moscow, Novosibirsk, Tbilisi, and Leningrad). In addition to extensive exhibitions across the United States and abroad, 110 paintings from the Collection were exhibited at the Denver Art Museum in 2000 under the title “Painters and the American West”. While paintings from The Anschutz Collection have on occasion been loaned to other institutions for exhibition, the Collection remained private and unavailable for public viewing until 2010 when the American Museum of Western Art was founded as its permanent home. The Anschutz Collection surveys the history of the development of American Art as it pertains to the West and provides examples from all of the schools that contributed to that development.
