Originally published in Points West magazineSummer 2009 On the heels of Lewis and Clark: Charles Fritz follows the inspiring visions of western artist-explorers By Christine C. BrindzaFormer Curatorial Assistant, Whitney Western Art Museum The work we are now doing is, I trust, done for posterity, in such a way that they need not repeat it. […]
William Jacob Hays, a friend of Bierstadt’s, was awestruck by the bison herds along the Missouri, and wrote, “On my way down the river I saw thousands of buffalo; they covered the bluff and prairie as far as we could see.” But on his journey west in 1860, Hays also recognized ominous warning signals for […]
Bierstadt’s painting The Last of the Buffalo served as a final, desperate call to save a species from near-certain annihilation. But he was not the first—nor the last—to use an artist’s tools in support of environmental conservation. Throughout the 19th century and beyond artists shaped perceptions of the American bison and voiced early concerns about […]