Mirror Lake A, No. 35 from the series "California and The Pacific Coast, West from Omaha"
Medium
Albumen print, stereo
Dimensions
Each image: 7.7 × 7.2 cm (3 1/16 × 2 7/8 in.); Card: 8.8 × 17.7 cm (3 1/2 × 7 in.)
Classification
stereograph (albumen)
Department
Photography and Media
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Accession Number
103159
Art Historical Context
**Mirror Lake A, No. 35 from "California and The Pacific Coast West from Omaha"** Joseph Russell, a pioneering 19th-century photographer best known for documenting the Union Railroad's construction during America's westward expansion, captured the ethereal beauty of Yosemite's Mirror Lake in this stereograph. Part of his expansive series chronicling the journey from Omaha to California's Pacific shores, *Mirror Lake A* showcases the lake's glassy surface mirroring towering granite cliffs—likely including iconic Half Dome—evoking the sublime grandeur of the American West during the post-Civil...
About the Artist
Andrew Joseph Russell · 1830–1902
Andrew Joseph Russell (1829–1902) was a pioneering American photographer whose work captured the raw drama of the Civil War and the monumental engineering of the transcontinental railroad. Born on March 20, 1829, in Walpole, New Hampshire, to Joseph Russell and Harriet Robinson, he grew up in Nunda, New York, where he developed an early passion for painting, creating portraits, landscapes, and eve...