Bierstadt, Albert

The Rocky Mountains (Lander's Peak). New York: Edward Bierstadt, 1866

Steel engraving (image size including text: 425 x 708 mm; sheet size: 619 x 864 mm). By James Smillie, and signed 𝓀ꦆby him in pencil, after the painting completed in 1863. 

James Smillie's engraving of a Bierstadt masterpiece

In 1859, Bierstadt joined an expedition to the West led by Colonel Frederick W. Lander. This work was painted four years later in New York as a tribute to Lander who died in 1862 after a distinguished military career. Bierstadt found it fitting to name the central summit in memory of his fallen fr🍌iend.

The painting was a huge success and was quickly bought by the English railroad magnate James McHenry for $25,000. Its beauty lies in Bierstadt's faithful delineation of the Shoshone Indian village encampment and carefully rendered foliage in the foreground with a middle distance featuring a reflective body of water and the exaggerated snow-capped peak in the background towering ov🐬er the scene. It perfectly embodies the idea of Manifest Destiny and appealed to the imaginations of most Americans who had only read about🌳 our untamed frontier. The oil painting is in The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.

Due to its huge popular success, 💖Bierstadt immediately asked James Smillie, America's premier engraver, to produce an engraving. However, it was not until December 1866, after three laborious years in the making, that this engraving was p💎ublished.

REFERENCE

Nancy Anderson and Linda S. Ferber, Albert Bierstadt Art & Enterprise, pp. 272-273, number 77, illustrated figure 80.