Speakers at this afternoon symposium will place Church’s paintings and his travels within a broader interdisciplinary context, drawing upon history, science, religious studies, and literature. A light reception will follow.
Dr. Kenneth Myers: “Evangel in Art: Frederic Church and Christianity”
Dr. Myers is the organizing curator of Frederic Church: A Painter’s Pilgrimage and head of the department of American art the Detroit Institute of Arts, where, since 2005, he has served as curator of American art. A cultural historian specializing in American landscape painting and the history of arts patronage, Myers has written extensively on Frederic Church and Church’s teacher Thomas Cole. Myers will provide insight into Church’s life and career with particular focus on the artist’s understanding of the relationship between religious truth and scientific truth.
Dr. Jennifer Raab: “Sacred Geographies: Frederic Church, the Holy Land, and the Hudson Valley”
Dr. Raab, assistant professor, history of art department, at Yale University, is the author of Frederic Church: The Art and Science of Detail. Dr. Raab will address Church's travels through the Middle East by focusing on his New York home, Olana – the creation of that landscape as well as the house and collection – and specifically considering his paintings of Jerusalem and Petra.
Dr. Timothy Barringer: “‘Incarnadines the multitudinous sea’: Frederic Church, John Ruskin and the Legacy of Turner”
Dr. Barringer, Paul Mellon Professor of British Art and chair, history of art department at Yale University, is a renowned scholar and curator of landscape painting in a global context. He organized American Sublime: Landscape Painting in the United States (with Andrew Wilton; Tate Britain, London) and is the curator of Thomas Cole’s Journey: Atlantic Crossings (forthcoming in 2018 at the Metropolitan Museum of Art). This talk will examine the relationship between Frederic Church’s major works and the art criticism of John Ruskin.
The Finest Eye: A Symposium on Frederic Church has been sponsored by the Wake Forest University Humanities Institute with support made possible by a major grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities.
Image: Detail, Frederic Edwin Church, Al Ayn (The Fountain), 1882. Oil on canvas. Mead Museum of Art, Amherst College, MA, USA. Overall: 23 15/16 × 36 1/4 inches (60.8 × 92.1 cm). Gift of Herbert W. Plimpton: The Hollis W. Plimpton (Class of 1915) Memorial Collection.