Circle Walls, Cañon de Chelle. Here the Cañon bends from an easterly direction nearly due north, the walls maintaining a perpendicular height of about 1.200 feet, No. 22 from the series "Geographical Explorations and Surveys West of the 100th Meridian"
Medium
Albumen print, stereo
Dimensions
Each image: 9.2 × 7.4 cm (3 5/8 × 2 15/16 in.); Card: 10 × 17.7 cm (3 15/16 × 7 in.)
Classification
stereograph (albumen)
Department
Photography and Media
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Accession Number
210780
Art Historical Context
Timothy O’Sullivan’s “Circle Walls, Cañon de Chelle” captures a dramatic bend in Arizona’s Canyon de Chelly, where sheer sandstone cliffs rise about 1,200 feet. Created in 1873 during the U.S. Army’s Geographical Surveys West of the 100th Meridian, the stereograph belongs to a series that documented the geology, topography, and Indigenous lands of the American Southwest for government and scientific audiences. O’Sullivan, already renowned for his Civil War battlefield images, brought the same clarity and compositional restraint to Western landscapes. Working with a mobile darkroom, he produce...
About the Artist
Timothy O'Sullivan · 1840–1882
Timothy H. O'Sullivan (c. 1840–1882) emerged as one of America's pioneering photographers during a transformative era. His early life remains sparsely documented, with records suggesting he was born either in New York City or Ireland before immigrating young, possibly growing up on Staten Island. As a teenager, he apprenticed under Mathew Brady at his Fulton Street gallery in New York, mastering w...