Lure of the West: Treasures from the Smithsonian American Art Museum

by National Museum of American Art (U. S.); Pastan, Amy

• ISBN13: 9780823001910
• ISBN10: 0823001911
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2000-06-01
• Publisher: Random House Inc

Summary

A collection of paintings and sculptures by artists who travelled west in theecades following explorations by Lewis and Clark. Emmanuel Leutze, Albertierstadt and Thomas Moran portrayed the expanding frontier as a fertileield for democratic enterprise. Pristine wilderness contended with rapidconomic development in pictures of the Gold Rush and western settlements.uch artists as Charles Bird King, George Catlin, Irving Couse and Olinarner created artworks that express changing attitudes toward Nativemerican cultures over several decades, ranging from curious and admiring inhe early years to elegiac and resigned as the tribal groups were defeatednd confined on reservations. In the 1890s, the rugged landscapes and exoticispanic cultures of the Southwest inspired a generation of artists known ashe Taos School, who romanticized the West as a place of primal beauty andpiritual values.