Where the Buffalo Roamed
Monument Valley, 2016
14½ x 22″, Epson HDR on Hahnemuhle Pearl
The myth of the American West, created by countless novels and artworks and embellished by Hollywood, surrounds us still and colors the reality of ordinary life. Myths of cowboys and Indians that Hollywood created from the raw life of nineteenth-century western America are now visible mainly in murals and window displays.
Chief Yellowhorse, NM, 2013
14½ x 22″, Epson HDR on Hahnemuhle Pearl
The myth of the American West, created by countless novels and artworks and embellished by Hollywood, surrounds us still and colors the reality of ordinary life. Myths of cowboys and Indians that Hollywood created from the raw life of nineteenth-century western America are now visible mainly in murals and window displays.
Chief Yellowhorse, NM, 2015
14½ x 22″, Epson HDR on Hahnemuhle Pearl
The myth of the American West, created by countless novels and artworks and embellished by Hollywood, surrounds us still and colors the reality of ordinary life. Myths of cowboys and Indians that Hollywood created from the raw life of nineteenth-century western America are now visible mainly in murals and window displays.
Silver City, NM , 2017
14½ x 22″, Epson HDR on Hahnemuhle Pearl
The myth of the American West, created by countless novels and artworks and embellished by Hollywood, surrounds us still and colors the reality of ordinary life. Myths of cowboys and Indians that Hollywood created from the raw life of nineteenth-century western America are now visible mainly in murals and window displays.
Monument Valley, 2012
14½ x 22″, Epson HDR on Hahnemuhle Pearl
The myth of the American West, created by countless novels and artworks and embellished by Hollywood, surrounds us still and colors the reality of ordinary life. Myths of cowboys and Indians that Hollywood created from the raw life of nineteenth-century western America are now visible mainly in murals and window displays.
Española, NM, 2016
14½ x 22″, Epson HDR on Hahnemuhle Pearl
The myth of the American West, created by countless novels and artworks and embellished by Hollywood, surrounds us still and colors the reality of ordinary life. Myths of cowboys and Indians that Hollywood created from the raw life of nineteenth-century western America are now visible mainly in murals and window displays.
Oshkosh, NE, 2017
14½ x 22″, Epson HDR on Hahnemuhle Pearl
The myth of the American West, created by countless novels and artworks and embellished by Hollywood, surrounds us still and colors the reality of ordinary life. Myths of cowboys and Indians that Hollywood created from the raw life of nineteenth-century western America are now visible mainly in murals and window displays.
Mancos, CO, 2016
14½ x 22″, Epson HDR on Hahnemuhle Pearl
The myth of the American West, created by countless novels and artworks and embellished by Hollywood, surrounds us still and colors the reality of ordinary life. Myths of cowboys and Indians that Hollywood created from the raw life of nineteenth-century western America are now visible mainly in murals and window displays.
Las Vegas, NM, 2015
14½ x 22″, Epson HDR on Hahnemuhle Pearl
The myth of the American West, created by countless novels and artworks and embellished by Hollywood, surrounds us still and colors the reality of ordinary life. Myths of cowboys and Indians that Hollywood created from the raw life of nineteenth-century western America are now visible mainly in murals and window displays.
Custer, SD, 2015
14½ x 22″, Epson HDR on Hahnemuhle Pearl
The myth of the American West, created by countless novels and artworks and embellished by Hollywood, surrounds us still and colors the reality of ordinary life. Myths of cowboys and Indians that Hollywood created from the raw life of nineteenth-century western America are now visible mainly in murals and window displays.
Shiprock, NM
14½ x 22″, Epson HDR on Hahnemuhle Pearl
The myth of the American West, created by countless novels and artworks and embellished by Hollywood, surrounds us still and colors the reality of ordinary life. Myths of cowboys and Indians that Hollywood created from the raw life of nineteenth-century western America are now visible mainly in murals and window displays.
Holbrook, AZ, 2013
14½ x 22″, Epson HDR on Hahnemuhle Pearl
The myth of the American West, created by countless novels and artworks and embellished by Hollywood, surrounds us still and colors the reality of ordinary life. Myths of cowboys and Indians that Hollywood created from the raw life of nineteenth-century western America are now visible mainly in murals and window displays.
Cortez, CO, 2016
14½ x 22″, Epson HDR on Hahnemuhle Pearl
The myth of the American West, created by countless novels and artworks and embellished by Hollywood, surrounds us still and colors the reality of ordinary life. Myths of cowboys and Indians that Hollywood created from the raw life of nineteenth-century western America are now visible mainly in murals and window displays.
Interior, SD, 2015
14½ x 22″, Epson HDR on Hahnemuhle Pearl
The myth of the American West, created by countless novels and artworks and embellished by Hollywood, surrounds us still and colors the reality of ordinary life. Myths of cowboys and Indians that Hollywood created from the raw life of nineteenth-century western America are now visible mainly in murals and window displays.
Pocatello, ID, 2017
14½ x 22″, Epson HDR on Hahnemuhle Pearl
The myth of the American West, created by countless novels and artworks and embellished by Hollywood, surrounds us still and colors the reality of ordinary life. Myths of cowboys and Indians that Hollywood created from the raw life of nineteenth-century western America are now visible mainly in murals and window displays.
Gallup, NM
14½ x 22″, Epson HDR on Hahnemuhle Pearl
The myth of the American West, created by countless novels and artworks and embellished by Hollywood, surrounds us still and colors the reality of ordinary life. Myths of cowboys and Indians that Hollywood created from the raw life of nineteenth-century western America are now visible mainly in murals and window displays.
Tucumcari, NM, 2017
14½ x 22″, Epson HDR on Hahnemuhle Pearl
The myth of the American West, created by countless novels and artworks and embellished by Hollywood, surrounds us still and colors the reality of ordinary life. Myths of cowboys and Indians that Hollywood created from the raw life of nineteenth-century western America are now visible mainly in murals and window displays.
Silverton, CO, 2016
14½ x 22″, Epson HDR on Hahnemuhle Pearl
The myth of the American West, created by countless novels and artworks and embellished by Hollywood, surrounds us still and colors the reality of ordinary life. Myths of cowboys and Indians that Hollywood created from the raw life of nineteenth-century western America are now visible mainly in murals and window displays.
Farmington, NM, 2016
14½ x 22″, Epson HDR on Hahnemuhle Pearl
The myth of the American West, created by countless novels and artworks and embellished by Hollywood, surrounds us still and colors the reality of ordinary life. Myths of cowboys and Indians that Hollywood created from the raw life of nineteenth-century western America are now visible mainly in murals and window displays.
Amarillo, TX, 2016
14½ x 22″, Epson HDR on Hahnemuhle Pearl
The myth of the American West, created by countless novels and artworks and embellished by Hollywood, surrounds us still and colors the reality of ordinary life. Myths of cowboys and Indians that Hollywood created from the raw life of nineteenth-century western America are now visible mainly in murals and window displays.
Wendover, NV, 2016
14½ x 22″, Epson HDR on Hahnemuhle Pearl
The myth of the American West, created by countless novels and artworks and embellished by Hollywood, surrounds us still and colors the reality of ordinary life. Myths of cowboys and Indians that Hollywood created from the raw life of nineteenth-century western America are now visible mainly in murals and window displays.
Many Glacier, MT, 2017
14½ x 22″, Epson HDR on Hahnemuhle Pearl
The myth of the American West, created by countless novels and artworks and embellished by Hollywood, surrounds us still and colors the reality of ordinary life. Myths of cowboys and Indians that Hollywood created from the raw life of nineteenth-century western America are now visible mainly in murals and window displays.
Book | Where the Buffalo Roamed
Where the Buffalo Roamed: Images of the New West
Photographs and text by Joan Myers
Essay by Lucy R. Lippard
DAMIANI EDITORE
Hdk. 12 x 9.75 in. /148 pgs/102 color and b/w images
ISBN: 978–88-6208–656‑1 $50.00
Publication date: October 2019
Available at bookstores everywhere,
from Distributed Art Publishers (DAP)
or from Amazon.
In this latest collection of photographs, taken over the last forty-plus years, Joan Myers turns her lens to the contemporary American West. In so doing, she turns our conception of western landscapes and the life contained within them upside down, revealing the changes the region has undergone over the last half-century. Her perspective is at once elegiac and ironic, capturing the myth and reality of the West, its shaping and appropriation by Hollywood, popular culture, and the ever-present, but fracturing American dream.
A larger-than-life statue of a cowboy stands on the same lot with a 1960s Cadillac Coupe de Ville. A man in Wrangler jeans and a cowboy hat sits for his portrait on a dais with a Hopi maiden, cows, and deer made out of barbed wire in front of a curtain featuring a photograph of iconic cliffs and sky. A billboard buffalo stands in a field flanked by red rock cliffs on one side and oil refineries on the other with a sign announcing, “Scenic Areas—Indian Country.” A cardboard John Wayne-lookalike cowboy poses by a fence topped by saddles and a sign that says, “We accept all credit cards.”