2019
ingenuity
OUR 8TH ANNUAL
CELEBRATION OF
THE CREATIVE
BREAKTHROUGHS
SHAPING THE WORLD
Imaging a black hole required telescopes
on four continents. A gene therapy discov-
ery in Tennessee involved physicians from
Poland and Germany. That sensational
song by Lil Nas X included a beat produced
in the Netherlands. Several achievements
we salute here, it turns out, have an inter-
national dimension. Isn’t it curious that our
typical American openness to collabora-
tion is often essential to ingenuity?
SMITHSONIAN AMERICAN
AWARDS
December 2019 | SMITHSONIAN.COM 45
A year after Lil
Nas X released
his hit song “Old
Town Road,” he
can’t wait for
what’s next: “I
feel incredible. I
feel good about
the future.”
photograph by KAYLA REEFER