Art and collectibles— Western, Native American, Hispanic Folk and Religious— displayed in an iconic turn-of-the-century building.

The A.R. Mitchell Museum of Western Art opened in Trinidad in 1981 and in 1989 the museum purchased the historic Jamieson Dry Goods Store —

— a 1906 Western-style structure with original pressed-tin ceilings, wood floors and a horseshoe-shaped mezzanine, which became the permanent home of the museum. The “Mitch” has become an important venue for art, culture, history and tourism in southeastern Colorado. As a “native son,” Arthur Roy Mitchell, and the museum named after him, are fiercely protected and honored by the Trinidad community.

During the 1870s and 1880s Trinidad was the headquarters of the largest cattle and sheep operation in the state of Colorado. A booming cow town filled with cowboys, cowhands and ranchers, Trinidad's streets and neighboring towns were home to the horses, cattle and beloved cowboys and cowgirls that A.R. Mitchell would paint and immortalize throughout his career.

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"Paintings of the real cowboy — not the movie variety..."

The King of Western Pulp Illustrations.

— From the 1920s through the 1940s, he animated their covers with more than one-hundred-and-sixty paintings, the largest collection of which is displayed at the A.R. Mitchell Museum. The main gallery houses upwards of three-hundred-and-fifty paintings by Mitchell and his contemporaries, with adjacent collections of Spanish and Native American folk art— Bultos, retablos, tinwork, Penitente artifacts, indigenous pottery and textiles, many gathered by Mitchell over the course of his life.

Mitchell was not just an artist who painted the cowboy as a hero, he lived as a as a cowboy, himself— working as a ranch hand in his youth and riding horses throughout his life. He often traveled to nearby Santa Fe, New Mexico to visit Native American pueblos including Tesuque, Santa Clara, San Idelfonso, San Juan and Taos. Mitchell's life growing up immersed in the last golden days of the old West set the stage for his love of all things Western, and his artistic talent and training allowed him to become one of the most influential cowboy illustrators of his time in the great tradition of Frederick Remington and Charles M. Russell.

Mitchell’s vision of the American West was vivid and vibrant; his penchant for detail, evocative colors and striking scenes set his commissions apart and cemented his legacy as an enduring figure in Americana. His covers for publications such as True West, Western Story, Ace-High, and Cowboy Stories included authors such as Zane Grey, Max Brand, and Jack London, placing his visuals in conversation with some of the most resonant voices of the 20th century. His paintings both reflected and impressed upon this seminal time, passing his bold images into the contemporary moment of the West.