National Parks and the American Landscape (with signed letter)
DC: Smithsonian, 1972. First edition. Softcover. A catalog of an exhibition held at the Smithsonian Institution National Collection of Fine Arts, June 23-Aug. 27, 1972, presented as part of the National Parks Centennial Year. Laid in is a related short letter on Department of the Interior stationary to landscape painter Jean B. Egan from Grant Midgley, Chief of Publications and Public Inquiries. Egan may have been a contributor to the exhibit, as she painted national parks, but she isn't featured in the catalog. Includes painters you might imagine like Albert Bierstadt, Thomas Moran, Thomas Hill, William Kieth, William Holmes, as well as sketches by John Muir. Rogers Morton provides a short intro about the Centennial, and curators William H. Truettner and Robin Bolton-Smith provide a long contextualizing essay. The exhibit is organized by park and features 17 parks. With a bibliography at rear. Small quarto in textured brown illustrated wraps, with map endpapers. A very good copy with sunning to spine that wraps onto the front cover, but noteworthy in light of the letter and nice compact history of art in the National Parks. Very good. Item #1958
Price: $125.00 save 5% $118.75