My Path Did Not Just Cross Goldwell Open Air Museum
By Michelle Graves
What a whirlwind the past year has been! For a condensed story, over the summer of 2023 I first heard about Goldwell Open Air Museum and a call for temporary outdoor sculptures through fellow Las Vegas artist Brian Gibson. I applied to the call for art as well as a Nevada Arts Council Project Grant and was accepted to both. The sculpture exhibit was canceled but I pursued the installation anyway and was told, “Absolutely yes,” by Goldwell Open Air Museum Executive Director Suzanne Hackett-Morgan. So I installed my 4’ x 30’ text sculpture called Keep Going in October 2023.
Michelle Graves standing next to her Keep Going sculpture installed at Goldwell Open Air Museum, October 2023.
Photo by Brian Gibson.
Fast forward to almost an exact year from that installation, I am now the President of Goldwell Open Air Museum under the wings of Hackett-Morgan who formed and has kept the non-profit alive for 30 years along with her husband Charles Morgan. She is reinforcing the phenomenal connection I feel with Goldwell Open Air Museum, the land that it lives on, and the nearby quirky small town of Beatty, Nevada. My path did not just cross Goldwell, it has begun to deeply weave itself into a purposeful aspect of my life.
As an observant artist who was born and raised in the flat, green, four-season Midwest, the vast and desolate desert landscape was something in my imagination. I mainly experienced it through Wylie Coyote childhood cartoons, television and movies. I know farmland very well—corn as far as the eye can see until it grows tall enough to get lost in its fields. But this quiet, serene, dry, rocky, mountainous land has an essence of a mystical history that feels very different. I cannot help but think of native communities who have survived here before. I did not feel historically native in my midwestern Indiana upbringing and I am less native now, but I thoroughly respect what has come before me. And now that Goldwell Open Air Museum has entered my life and I have interacted with the land and its community, I am honored to care for it in my role as president. I am gladly and whole-heartedly taking on this role alongside some creatively amazing, willing, and able friends.
Michelle Graves repainting 25’ tall Goldwell sculpture, Lady Desert: Venus of Nevada by Dr. Hugo Heyrman in May 2024.
Photo by Brian Gibson.
In 1984, a sculpture by Belgian artist Albert Szukalski was built in Rhyolite, one of the most famous ghost towns of the western United States, which is walking distance from the current Goldwell Open Air Museum sculpture park. Because of Szukalski’s affinity for the southwest American desert, he brought other artists to make large sculptures to join his, thus creating Goldwell Open Air Museum. Forty years later in 2024, we are celebrating Szukalski’s vision and honoring his dying request (in the year 2000) for Suzanne and Charles to, “Keep it going.”
Goldwell Open Air Museum is hosting a free weekend event on October 18-20, 2024, to celebrate the 40 years of this beautiful anomaly in the desert. After a parade from Rhyolite to Goldwell, the Lieutenant Governor and Director of Tourism, Stavros Anthony, will be giving welcoming remarks alongside a Nevada Arts Council representative. Former Goldwell artist residents will be present to share their work inspired by their experience at Goldwell among many other happenings. I encourage all to join us and experience this special Nevada treasure. Click HERE to learn more.
Michelle Graves is an interdisciplinary artist whose main bodies of work include existential text influenced by scientific and anatomical research. She has been exhibiting artwork since childhood and has shown consistently throughout her life as well as in London and Tokyo in recent years. Graves has a BFA in Photography from Indiana University (2003) and an MFA in Interdisciplinary Arts and Media from Columbia College Chicago (2012). She thrived in the Chicago art scene for 16 years and has resided in Las Vegas since 2021. Graves is currently the President of Goldwell Open Air Museum, the Art Coordinator for the upcoming Arty's Steakhouse in Las Vegas, and Design Director/Adobe Instructor for Denver Ad School. Learn more about Michelle Graves and her work at gravesmichelle.com.
Double Down blogger photo by Michelle Graves.