SANTA CRUZ, CA.- The Santa Cruz Museum of Art & History opened Accidentally Wes Anderson: Adventures in Santa Cruz, an exhibition on view at the MAH from January 24–May 18, 2025. The show takes guests on a visual journey to the most beautiful, idiosyncratic locations around the globe—including Santa Cruz County—all seemingly plucked from the whimsical world of visionary filmmaker Wes Anderson.
Explore the world through a Wes Anderson lens! Click here to purchase "Accidentally Wes Anderson" on Amazon and discover real-life locations that perfectly capture the filmmaker's iconic aesthetic.
From impossibly grand hotels and chateaus to idyllic lighthouses, cable cars, and train carriages, AWA explores the filmmaker’s distinct aesthetic, whether a perfectly symmetrical landscape or a European city brimming with technicolor structures. The MAH exhibition, which includes a selection of community-sourced images of quirky places and locales in Central Coast California, is also presented as homage to the centennial celebration of the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk’s Giant Dipper roller coaster, an Anderson-esque vintage wooden coaster that debuted in 1924.
Born off the back of a viral online phenomenon and community of the same name, AWA celebrates the undeniable visual vernacular of one of cinema’s greatest filmmakers. Each of the locations highlighted in the exhibition boasts the recognizable singular aesthetic that is oh-so typical of film master Wes Anderson. Bright, vivid, and often slightly jarring to reality, AWA collects the world’s most Anderson-like sites in all their faded grandeur and pop-pastel colors, telling the story behind each stranger-than-fiction location. Authorized by Anderson himself, the exhibition and its companion books celebrate much of the weird and wonderful architecture that exists in our unique world, paying tribute to travel, photography, community, and adventure.
AWA photo contributors have been called “adventurers” who range from travelers, architects, history buffs, artists, editors, photographers, to teachers, students, and all walks of life intrigued by the wonders of the world and civilization. For the Santa Cruz exhibition, which highlights photography from around the globe alongside similarly-inspired images of Santa Cruz County and the greater Central Coast region, AWA and the MAH are issuing a call for submissions from Santa Cruz locals and visitors seeking real-life images of the popular seaside destination that mimic the famous filmmaker's aesthetic.
“We are so excited to bring this exhibition to Santa Cruz with its boardwalk, beaches, and iconic California attractions” said AWA Co-Founder Wally Koval. “Our team loves getting lost in all the amazing photo and video submissions the AWA Community sends our way, and we cannot wait to share a beautifully curated selection in one of our favorite parts of the country.”
Wes Anderson is a modern auteur: a film director, a producer, and a screenwriter. He is famed for his atypical directorial style as witnessed in the multi-awarded Rushmore (1998), The Royal Tenenbaums (2001), Moonrise Kingdom (2012), The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014), Asteroid City (2023), among many others. He is recognized for his unique visual and narrative approach, all painted in colorful imagery, sometimes animated or scaled in miniature models.
Artdaily participates in the Amazon Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn commissions by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites. When you purchase through our links, we may earn a small commission at no additional cost to you. These commissions help us continue curating and sharing the art world’s latest news, stories, and resources with our readers.
