Lake Linangua, 14 miles from Chattanooga, Tennessee
1864–66
Medium
Albumen silver print from glass negative
Dimensions
Image: 10 1/4 × 13 1/8 in. (26.1 × 33.4 cm) Sheet: 10 1/4 × 13 1/8 in. (26.1 × 33.4 cm)
Classification
Photographs
Department
Photographs
Museum
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Credit
Purchase, Vital Projects Fund Inc. Gift, through Joyce and Robert Menschel, 2019
Accession Number
2019.500
Tags
Art Historical Context
George N. Barnard created this evocative landscape photograph of Lake Linangua near Chattanooga, Tennessee, between 1864 and 1866, during the final years of the American Civil War. As one of the era’s pioneering photographers, Barnard worked extensively in the South, capturing both the war’s devastation and the quiet resilience of the natural world. This serene view of the lake offers a striking contrast to the conflict raging nearby, inviting viewers to reflect on how the land endured amid national upheaval. The image is an albumen silver print made from a glass negative, a medium that allow...
About the Artist
George N. Barnard · 1819–present
George N. Barnard (1819–1902) was a pioneering American photographer whose six-decade career spanned the dawn of the medium, from daguerreotypes to Civil War documentation. Born into a farming family in Coventry, Connecticut, on December 23, 1819, he lost his father at age seven and apprenticed in family businesses before marrying in 1843 and relocating to Oswego, New York. There, he launched one ...