WANTED: American Rodeo Queen at COCA Gallery Seattle

WANTED: American Rodeo Queen at COCA

In 2008, my American Rodeo Queen series was exhibited at the Center on Contemporary Art (COCA) in Seattle in a show titled WANTED.

The series began with my own unlikely introduction to rodeo. In 1985, I entered the Days of the Old West Hailey Rodeo Queen competition on a dare and unexpectedly became Miss Days of the Old West, Hailey Rodeo Queen. What began as one year in the rodeo world became the starting point for decades of photographing the American West.

Fashion, Femininity and the American Rodeo Queen

I was drawn to rodeo queens from the beginning. My background and interest in fashion influenced the way I photographed them: the hats, elaborate Western clothing, boots, buckles, crowns, horses, color, and individuality.

With WANTED, I wanted to look beyond the traditional idea of the rodeo queen and photograph these women as Western icons in their own right. The portraits explore the combination of fashion, femininity, horsemanship, strength, and individuality that makes rodeo queen culture so visually fascinating.

The series is also part of a larger story in my work. Rodeo queens led me deeper into photographing rodeo, ranch life, horses, roadside Americana, and the people and landscapes of the West.

American Rodeo Queen at COCA

Seeing the photographs exhibited together at COCA was an important moment for the series. Presented as a complete body of work, WANTED gave the portraits a space to move beyond crowns and pageantry and explore the women, traditions, and visual culture behind the title.

Looking back, the exhibition remains an important chapter in my ongoing photography of the American West and in a subject that first caught my eye in 1985.

My deepest thanks to Joe Roberts and the COCA team for giving WANTED such a memorable stage in Seattle.