Seeing America – Periods: 1980-present

Jamie Wyeth, Kalounna in Frogtown, 1986, oil on masonite, 91.4 x 127.3 cm (Terra Foundation for American Art, Daniel J. Terra Collection, 1992.163) ©Jamie Wyeth — The Wyeths have a long history of painting the American story

An American Story

Thumbnail, Courtney Leonard, ARTIFICE Ellipse | Log: 18-3, coiled micaceous clay with glaze, 5 3/8 x 15 x 7 inches (Newark Museum of Art) © Courtney M. Leonard — A Shinnecock artist's view

Endangered coastlines and lifeways

Jaune Quick-To-See Smith, State Names, 2000 (Smithsonian American Art Museum) — How maps can change our minds.

Teaching guide
Jaune Quick-To-See Smith, State Names

Hock E Aye VI Edgar Heap of Birds, Native Hosts (Arkansas), 2018, aluminum sign, series of seven, 46.7 x 92.5 cm (Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, ©Hock E Aye VI Edgar Heap of Birds) — Signs that guide historical understanding

Native Hosts

Thumbnail - Sue Coe, Aids won't wait, the enemy is here not in Kuwait, 1990, photo-etching on paper, 23.8 x 32.5 cm (Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, © Sue Coe) — Sue Coe's Aids won't wait, the enemy is here not in Kuwait, 1990

An artist asks: war or healthcare?

The river's brilliant reflections gave shape to this enormous sculpture in silver

Mapping nature’s stunning beauty

Finding heroism amidst one of the world's great environmental disasters.

A desert on fire, Salgado in Kuwait

MTV's moonman, first broadcast 1981 — It's never been harder to define "art" than it is today, but one thing is certain — artists are always having a conversation with the time they live in.

1980 – now

Roger Minick, Woman with Scarf at Inspiration Point, Yosemite National Park (Sightseer series), 1980, dye coupler print, 38.1 x 43.18 cm, ©Roger Minick (Los Angeles County Museum of Art) — The majesty of Yosemite National Park — with Roger Minick and the woman with the scarf.

Inspiration at Yosemite

Roger Shimomura, Diary: December 12, 1941, 1980, acrylic on canvas, 127.6 x 152.4 cm (Smithsonian American Art Museum, gift of the artist, © Roger Shimomura) — Superman makes an appearance in what looks (at first sight) like a Japanese print.

Superman, WWII, Japanese Americans

Stéphane Couturier, Fenetre, Eastlake Greens, San Diego, edition 4/8, 2001, dye coupler print, 130.81 x 107.95 x 2.54 cm (Los Angeles County Museum of Art, © Stéphane Couturier) — Building the American dream in the California desert.

Framing the American Dream

Jaune Quick-To-See Smith, State Names, 2000 (Smithsonian American Art Museum) — Native American artist Jaune Quick-To-See Smith offers a history to inform our present

Reading the United “States”

Armstead thumbnail — How can we begin to correct the lies of history? Artist Kenseth Armstead suggests a poetic solution.

Correcting the lies of history

Alison Saar, Topsy and the Golden Fleece, 2017, wood, tar, steel, ceiling tin, wire, acrylic paint and gold leaf, 35-1/2 x 11-1/2 x-8 1/2 inches (Toledo Museum of Art, ©Alison Saar) — A Greek myth and the American anti-Slavery novel, Uncle Tom's Cabin combine to upend our own contemporary myths

Turning Uncle Tom’s Cabin upside down

Wayne Thiebaud, Ponds and Streams, 2001, acrylic on canvas, 182.9 x 152.4 cm (Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, ©Wayne Thiebaud) — A colorful perspective on agriculture, water, and pollution.

Teaching guide
Wayne Thiebaud, Ponds and Streams

Thornton Dial, Blood and Meat: Survival For The World, 1992, rope, carpet, copper Wire, metal, canvas scraps, enamel, and splash zone compound on canvas on wood, 165.1 x 241.3 x 27.9 cm (Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, ©Thornton Dial) — An unflinching memorial to civil rights martyrs by the contemporary artist Thorton Dial

A memorial to Civil Rights martyrs

Wayne Thiebaud, Ponds and Streams, 2001, acrylic on canvas, 182.9 x 152.4 cm (Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, ©Wayne Thiebaud) — Can the commonplace working farmland of California's Sacramento River Valley be a place of of breathtaking beauty?

The landscape remade

Titus Kaphar, The Cost of Removal thumb — Kaphar’s painting uses defacement as a way of critiquing Andrew Jackson, and makes us consider the injustices of presidents past and present.

Teaching guide
Titus Kaphar, The Cost of Removal

Masami Teraoka, American Kabuki, 1986, watercolor and sumi ink on paper mounted on a four-panel screen, 196.9 x 393.7 x 3 cm (de Young Museum, Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco) © Masami Teraoka — Teraoka draws on Japan's brilliant history of art and kabuki theatre to create beauty from heartrending tragedy

American Kabuki

James Turrell, Skyscape, The Way of Color, 2009, stone, concrete, stainless steel, and LED lighting 228 x 652 inches © James Turrell (Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Bentonville, Arkansas) — A viewing station for sunrise and sunset, Turrell’s work manipulates light, time, and perception.

Light, time, and transcendence