The gateway to the Rockies, Denver has always been about adventure and exploration - and its art scene is no exception. Visitors to the city can enjoy the artworks at the city's outstanding Clyfford Still Museum. The Mile High City, the Clyfford Still Museum is just one of a bevy of world-class galleries and museum contributing to Denver's rising status as a heavyweight of the American art world. Taking top billing is the Denver Art Museum, a work of art itself over two buildings, particularly the newer of the two, a jagged, shiny masterpiece by architect Daniel Libeskind, the brains behind New York City's Ground Zero rebirth.
Over two sites, Denver Art Museum boasts an extraordinary collection of 55,000 international works spanning the centuries, including pieces by Monet, Picasso and Warhol, and an outstanding American Indian art collection.
This November the museum will host the hotly anticipated Star Wars and the Power of Costume exhibition, giving fans the chance to look behind the scenes of the movie franchise before the release of the latest film, Rogue One, in December.
The skyscrapers of Denver mark the final transition between Great Plains and the mountains of the American West, so it's a fitting home for The American Museum of Western Art, too. Displayed in the beautiful old Navarre Building, the collection consists of more than 300 paintings by 180 artists in a salon-style setting, charting the history and beauty of the American West over time. At the other end of the spectrum, lower downtown Denver's futuristic-looking Museum of Contemporary Art is designed to 'minimise boundaries between the exterior galleries of the museum', and is flooded with natural light.
The art often extends beyond the gallery walls here, too. A growing street-art festival, Colorado Crush, held in the very hip River North (RiNo) Arts District, sees urban and graffiti artists swarm into town each September to showcase their talents. For the Denver Chalk Art Festival in June, the city's Larimer Square is turned into a giant canvas by hundreds of artists, who recreate original works in vivid pastel chalk.
For the international traveller, Denver is no longer just a handy jumping-off point for car hire before heading into the mountains. In fact, with the new multimillion-dollar train link between the airport and downtown, you don't need a car or mountains on your next visit. The Rockies might be all around the Mile High City, but art is at its heart