Since its founding in 1987, American Art has been an indispensable source for scholars, educators, curators, museum-goers, collectors, and professors and students at colleges and universities worldwide. The journal critically engages material and conceptual conditions of art and provides a forum for the expanding field of American art history. It considers the role played by art in the ongoing transnational and transcultural formation of America as a contested geography, identity, and idea. Full-color plates and concise prose offer broad appeal.
Current Issue
Nell Blaine, Summer Bouquet and Chair, 1963. Oil on canvas, 24 × 20 in. Courtesy of the Estate of Nell Blaine and Tibor de Nagy Gallery, New York
In the Spring 2025 issue of American Art:
The commentaries visualize nineteenth-century resource extraction, while the feature articles explore Nell Blaine’s community of poets and painters, the localized conflict about WPA mural planning, and the scientific medium of spirit photography. Contributors include Monica Bravo, Maura Coughlin, Christine Garnier, Emily Gephart, John P. Jacob, Ramey Mize, John Ott, and Christa Noel Robbins
Open-Access Features
Read the abstracts of the Spring 2025 issue.
Patricia and Phillip Frost Essay Award
The Frost Essay Award is presented annually in the spring to the author of an article published in American Art the previous year.
Subscribe to American Art
A one-year subscription for individuals costs $50, and provides full online access to all back issues of American Art. Members of Friends of the Smithsonian, Smithsonian National Associates, American Studies Association, and the College Art Association receive subscriptions at the discounted price of $40. The rate for students is $35. Higher rates apply for institutions.
Information on subscribing, purchasing single issues, or submitting articles to the journal is available through the co-publisher, the University of Chicago Press.
Access the Journal
Browse all issues of American Art, 1987 to present. The opinions expressed in the journal are those of the authors and not necessarily of the editors and the Smithsonian American Art Museum.
Write for American Art
American Art invites submissions of original scholarly manuscripts. Acceptance is determined by editorial needs and anonymized peer-review. For more information, see Journal Author Submission Guidelines. Prospective authors are welcome to write to executive editor Robin Veder and sign up for a consultation, if desired.
Editorial Board
- heather ahtone, First Americans Museum
- Kirsten Pai Buick, University of New Mexico
- Nika Elder, American University
- David J. Getsy, University of Virginia
- Michael Hatt, University of Warwick
- Chon A. Noriega, University of California, Los Angeles
- Andrea Pappas, Santa Clara University
- Jolene Rickard, Cornell University
- Nizan Shaked, California State University, Long Beach
- Louise Siddons, University of Southhampton
- Cherise Smith, University of Texas at Austin
- Shawn Michelle Smith, School of the Art Institute of Chicago