Gallery Hours:
Tuesdays through Saturdays, 12 noon-6 PM
Closed Monday, Sunday, and for all university holidays
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Current Exhibitions
Imagining the West: Selections from the Stan and Donna Goodbar Collection of Western Art
The Montana Museum of Art and Culture was recently humbled by the gift of a significant art collection of 125 works from Stan and Donna Goodbar in 2021. This collection helps reveal how artists interpreted the west during the 20th century. MMAC is proud to present a selection of these works featuring artists who made a living primarily as illustrators, both shaping and reinforcing quintessential myths about the West’s important archetypes, its settlers, cowboys and Indigenous inhabitants.
The exhibition will highlight artists who demonstrate the illustrative traditions of Western art and includes celebrated Montana artists like Ace Powell, Elizabeth Lochrie, John Clarke, Jo De Yong and O.C. Seltzer. The collection also contains works from artists of other western states such as California's Edward Borein, Will James and Olaf Wieghorst and modernists Frances Senska and Peter Voulkos.
For more information and the full press release follow this link.
Can't make it in person? Take a virtual tour!
Opens Friday, February 4th
Recent Exhibitions
The Montana Museum of Art and Culture will opened two new exhibitions with avian themes. The first, “Avis marvelous: Ornithology in 19th Century Art and Science” opened on Friday, September 24, and with run through January 8, 2022 in the Paxson Gallery of UM’s Performing Arts and Radio/TV Center.
This exhibition, about one of the most popular and fertile areas of study in the 19th century, will explore the convergent interests of artists and scientists. It combines prints from the Lee Silliman Collection and specimens from the University of Montana’s Philip L. Wright Zoological Museum.
“This exhibition presents the ways artists and scientists analyzed, documented, and celebrated avian life in the 19th century and explores the various strategies employed by artists and scholars of the natural sciences to create visual representations for works of art, publications and other printed works. It also recreates museum displays meant to educate and enlighten the public about bird life in the Americas,” said H. Rafael Chacón, the museum director.
A new exhibition, “The Speyer Collection of Contemporary Art,” opened on October 15 and will also run until January 8, 2022 in the MMAC’s Meloy Gallery in the PARTV Center.
Helena-based collector Tim Speyer is sharing a selection of works of art from his collection focused on human interactions with birds. According to MMAC director Chacón, “Speyer’s collection reveals a penchant for the surreal, enigmatic, and poetic among contemporary artists from around the world. Much of the work is figurative and focused on the complex ways humans share this planet with our fellow creatures.”
Educational programming will include a lecture by collector Lee Silliman on September 28 and a panel discussion with artists Barbara Michelman and Bishop Storrs, authors Marc Beaudin and Charles Finn, and biologists Angela Hornsby and Zac Cheviron on October 21.
Public receptions are scheduled for both opening nights from 5:30-7:30 PM. For information about educational programming or about scheduling tours for groups of over 10 people, please contact Kaitlyn Rawhouser at 406-243-4181 or e-mailing kaitlyn.rawhouser@umontana.edu.
Past Exhibitions:
Movement: Graphics and the Olympic Games
July 9th through August 28th
Meloy Gallery of UM's Performing Arts and Radio/TV Center
May 28th through Aug. 28th
Paxson Gallery of UM's Performing Arts and Radio/TV Center
MMAC Collections Committee, Directive on Social Justice
Adopted 9/11/2020
Adopted 9/11/2020
The Montana Museum of Art and Culture, the state’s largest publicly-owned collection of art, aspires to be an inclusive organization that supports, collects, and represents creative expression that rises from the breadth of the human experience.
Our efforts are strengthened by welcoming people of every race, gender, sexual orientation, religion, class, disability, age, national origin, and citizenship.
The MMAC Collections Committee pledges to prioritize the acquisition of work by Black, Indigenous and people of color (BIPOC), LGBTQ+, women, and other historically marginalized artists.
We further commit to seeking broadly diverse leadership, input, and participation in all aspects of the MMAC Collections Committee's work.
"Dear Montana Museum of Art & Culture, I want to tell you that I have been in a lot of museums and I have never seen a museum like that. I think that what you are doing is amazing and don't stop!"
Sincerely, Connor, 6th Grader, Lolo School
"Does an art museum teach us about the exhibits, or does it make us feel like we want to be a part of it? The Montana Museum of Art and Culture doesn't’t just teach you about exhibits like any other museum would, this museum makes you feel like you are a part of it…"
Colton Browder, UM Student
