Anchorage Museum’s ‘Unsettled’ is a sensory exploration of the ever-changing ‘Greater West’

You can smell the Anchorage Museum's newest exhibit "Unsettled" before you see it.

Whether you get there through the elevator, freshly printed with a culture-clashing collage by Alaska artist Nicholas Galanin, or the bending staircase, you'll smell the curry, chocolate and sandalwood as you ascend, beginning your trip to the Greater West: a region stretching from Alaska to the far reaches of South America.

"Unsettled" is a multi-floor sensory experience with more than 200 works of art meant to be seen, smelled, touched and heard at every turn. Just behind the arcing entrance, dozens of clay pots rest on the floor, filled to the brim with sand, spices and pigment. Ed Ruscha's "Chocolate Room" is wallpapered floor to ceiling with photo paper screen-printed with more than 800 bars of Hershey chocolate. A special edition scent made specifically for the exhibit by perfumer Bruno Fazzolari is on display and available for purchase at the gift shop. A screening room built from the floor up for the exhibit plays Bruce Conner's "Crossroads" on a constant loop; the mushroom clouds of nuclear blasts accompanied by an ambient, simmering lo-fi beat.

Artworks over 2,000 years old sit shoulder-to-shoulder with contemporary Western pieces from modern legends Georgia O'Keeffe, Ansel Adams, Trevor Paglen and more. Divided into five themes, the exhibit focuses on the ever-changing societal, geological and political makeup of the West.

Many works mingle styles, eras and traditions. Artist Brian Jungen's pieces, towering totem poles fashioned from golf bags and a traditional Native mask made of Nike Air Jordans, reflects the colliding experience of modern Native American people. Al Farrow's traditional pottery is stained with modern messages about nuclear history.

"It's really something in here," said Ryan Kenny, the associate director of exhibitions at the Anchorage Museum.

Over the course of a month, Kenny, the Anchorage Museum's scrappy exhibitions and collections team and a handful of contractors built "Unsettled" from the ground up, building entire new rooms and re-constructing art pieces unsuited for travel.

With scissor lifts "moving back and forth like a typewriter," the group spent a full week installing Chris Burden's "All the Submarines of the United States of America" by hand. The piece, which is meant to represent the 625 submarines used in U.S. military history, consists of 625 lacquered, cardboard submarines suspended in the air.

Kenny hopes that the exhibit will bring people from all over Alaska to the museum.

"These are issues up here in Alaska or wherever you're from that should resonate with everybody."

UNSETTLED is currently halfway through a three-city tour that began at the Nevada Museum of Art in Reno and will conclude at the Palm Springs Art Museum. After it closes in Anchorage on Sept. 9, the art will be packaged up into trucks, planes and boats and will make the trip to their next destination in the Greater West.