Sunset over Mountains
1860 - 1870
Classification
landscapes
Department
Smithsonian Collection
Museum
Smithsonian American Art Museum
Credit
Gift of Louis P. Church
Accession Number
1917-4-1170-b
About this artwork
Research in Progress
Art Historical Context
Frederic Edwin Church, aeminent American landscape painter of the Hudson River School (1826–1900), the sublime beauty of nature in *Sunset over Mountains* (ca. 1860–1870). Active during a transformative era in American art, Church drew inspiration from Romanticism and the nation's expanding frontiers, portraying vast wildernesses as manifestations of divine order and national pride. This work, housed in the Smithsonian American Art's Smithsonian Collection, exemplifies his fascination with dramatic natural phenomena, painted amid the Civil War years when landscapes offered solace and a sense o...