Visualizing Conflict in "The West as America"

Abstract

THE LAST TIME I saw The As America was morning after it closed. Curator Bill Truettner, intellectually open and generous as usual despite beating he was taking from press, had responded to my request for one last view, but by time we arrived in galleries of National Museum of American Art (NMAA) at 9 a.m., some boxes were already on floors, registrar's staff was carefully checking condition of works before packing them up, and text panels and labels had already been removed from walls. The resulting viewing as I threaded my way through rooms demonstrated what I had always felt: that The as America was a stunning exhibition which made its statement effectively through artifacts, visually, though no one in all of hullabaloo that occurred after its March 15, 1991 opening ever commented on this salient fact. The majority of visitors who chose to record their opinions in exhibition's three large comment books seemed to like show, though their responses both pro and con were frequently pointed and particular.' The response of public press, terms of which were largely established by The Washington Post's several commentaries, nationally syndicated, was mostly hostile. It was based upon neoconservative accusations of political correctness both for historically revisionist views and attitudes toward the West and for particular language and strategies of exhibition's textblocks and rather unusual fact that these were