Bozeman Magazine

MONTANA BORN Western Fine Art from the Land That Made Us New Montana-Born Fine Art Collective to Debut at the 2026 Western Design Conference in Bozeman Artists Allison McGree, Kelley J. Sullivan, and Hannah Uhde bring work made from within the American West to the conference’s first Montana edition — with a gallery preview at the LeeAnn Ramey Gallery and a season-long journey documented publicly online. BOZEMAN, Mont. — Montana Born, a new fine art collective co-founded by three Montana artists — Allison McGree, Kelley J. Sullivan, and Hannah Uhde — will make its formal debut as part of the juried Western Design Conference (WDC) Exhibit + Sale, August 6–9, 2026, at the Brick Breeden Fieldhouse on the Montana State University campus in Bozeman. The 2026 event marks the conference’s first edition in Montana after more than three decades in Wyoming, making it a fitting stage for a collective whose name is also its premise. Montana Born is built on a single conviction: that the land of the American West is not a subject to be depicted from a distance, but a place to be answered by the people who live in it. The three founding artists work in different mediums and different palettes, but they share a country — the rivers, ranges, and weather of Montana — and a belief that the West deserves art made from within it. Allison McGree and Hannah Uhde are both sixth-generation Montanans; all three artists keep studios within an hour of one another in the shadow of the Bridger and Tobacco Root ranges. The collective is not a gallery or a stylistic school. It is three independent practices in deliberate company — each artist continuing her own body of work, gallery representation, and collectors, while coming together for exhibitions and shared projects where the sum is more than the parts. “The West has a long tradition of being looked at — romanticized from a distance. We exist to look from within it. Our work is western because we are western.” — The artists of Montana Born WHY NOW For more than three decades, the Western Design Conference called Wyoming home; its 2026 move brings the country’s flagship gathering of western art and design to Montana for the first time. Montana Born debuts at exactly that hinge — three Montana painters stepping onto the floor not as visitors to the genre, but as people who live inside it. The timing is the point: the right artists, in the right place, at the moment the conversation about western art moves north.

A SNEAK PEEK AT THE LEEANN RAMEY GALLERY
Ahead of the WDC debut, Montana Born will offer collectors an early look at new work at a preview reception on Friday, July 17, 2026, from 6 to 8 p.m. at the LeeAnn Ramey Gallery, 27 North Tracy Avenue, in downtown Bozeman. The gallery is a natural home for the collective: Allison McGree and Hannah Uhde are both represented there, and Kelley J. Sullivan shows with the 27 North Tracy Artist Collective in the same space.