Writing the West

We invite writers across Colorado—both aspiring and established—to join us at AMWA for Writing the West, our monthly writing series combining art history, storytelling, and participants’ creative voices. To help inspire your writing, we’ll explore the Museum’s galleries, stopping to learn about specific paintings relevant to each month’s theme. After spending time with the paintings, you’ll be given a thematic, art-inspired writing prompt by Writing the West instructor, Dan Manzanares.
Throughout each writing session, you’ll have the chance to share your work next to the painting that inspired you. Writing the West is open to writers of all backgrounds, genres, and skill levels, even those who have never written creatively before!
Participants will have the opportunity to submit their writing to be included in the season’s Writing the West anthology. In April, we’ll host a Celebratory Reading where writers can invite family and friends to watch them present their work from the anthology in the galleries. Anthology contributors will receive a copy of the book, which will be displayed throughout AMWA’s galleries for all to enjoy.
Dan Manzanares has co-taught Writing the West with AMWA educators since the program’s inception in 2016. That same year, he won a Mayor’s Award for Excellence in Arts & Culture and in 2021 accepted a mayoral appointment to the Denver Commission on Cultural Affairs, where he served as chair. He received his MFA with a concentration in genre fiction from Western Colorado University. He’s an advisory board member of Sidewalk Poets and Rocky Mountain Reader; and teaches aspiring novelists at Story Quest.
This season will explore a different literary genre each month:
September 10 – Alternate History
October 8 – Weird West: Cowpunk
November 12 – Cozy Mystery
December 10 – Folklore
January 14 – Historical Fiction
February 11 – Traditional Western: Town-Tamer
April 8 – Celebratory Reading