Afterglow: Frederic Church and the Landscape of Memory

Olana State Historic Site, May 12 | October 27, 2024

Exhibition organized by The Olana Partnership Learn More

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November 19, 2023 – March 31, 2024
Sharp Family Gallery | Olana State Historic Site
Organized by The Olana Partnership

Spectacle: Frederic Church and the Business of Art combines immersive video technology with the wealth of Olana State Historic Site’s archival holdings to demonstrate how Church’s art responded to the most advanced scientific thought of his day and reached a broad public audience, the largest of any 19th-century American artist.

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The Olana Partnership, in collaboration with the New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation, presents Terraforming: Olana’s Historic Photography Collection Unearthed at Olana State Historic Site. Inspired by Olana’s significant collection of nearly 2,000 19th century international photographic prints, artist and guest curator David Hartt brings Terraforming, a selection of Frederic Church’s little-known photography collection, to reflect on the ways in which human culture and activity shape the land; eroding the boundary between human construction and the natural world just as …Read More

The Olana Partnership, in collaboration with the New York State Office of Parks, Recreation, and Historic Preservation, presents Chasing Icebergs: Art and a Disappearing Landscape, the first winter exhibition at Olana State Historic Site. The exhibition, shown primarily in the Sharp Family Gallery at Olana, highlights Frederic Church’s iceberg sketches from his 1859 intrepid voyage to the Arctic.

Risking his life, Church chartered a ship to the treacherous waters surrounding Newfoundland and Labrador—an area known as Iceberg Alley—on a mission that made him the first American artist to explore the region for the purpose of painting icebergs, …Read More

Cross Pollination: Heade, Cole, Church, and Our Contemporary Moment

June 12 – October 31, 2021
Presented at the Thomas Cole National Historic Site and Olana State Historic Site

A new exhibition exploring the theme of “cross pollination” in art and the environment from the 19th century to the contemporary moment. The project stems from the artist Martin Johnson Heade’s 19th century painting series of hummingbird and habitats and includes major paintings by Thomas Cole, Frederic Church, and contemporary art by Nick Cave, Jeffrey Gibson, Paula Hayes, Maya Lin, and more.

“Cross Pollination: Martin Johnson Heade, Frederic Church, Thomas Cole, and Our Contemporary Moment” …Read More

FALLEN by Jean Shin Olana’s East Lawn | May 2 – October 31, 2021

When the artist Frederic Church created Olana’s 250-acre naturalistic landscape, he planted thousands of native trees on a hillside that had been previously logged and deforested. His plantings included the eastern hemlock tree (Tsuga canadensis), a graceful native conifer that once thrived on the slopes of the nearby Catskill Mountains. In the 19th century, hundreds of thousands of hemlocks were cut down for the tanning industry, which used the tannin in the tree’s bark for the commercial demands of leather-making.

The devastating loss …Read More

“Memento Mori Mandalas” by Portia Munson Olana’s East Lawn | May 2 – October 31, 2021 Portia Munson is a nationally recognized artist based in Catskill, NY whose work is attuned to the interconnection of art and science and the toll of environmental loss, themes that are central to the exhibition Cross Pollination: Heade, Cole, Church, and Our Contemporary Moment. For this reason, The Olana Partnership has installed four arresting, monumental silk banners from her series Memento Mori Mandalas that visitors to Olana can discover throughout the artist-designed landscape from May 2 through October 31, 2021.

The …Read More

“What is Missing?” by Maya Lin Virtual | May 2 – October 31, 2021 “What Is Missing?” is a multi-sited memorial created by Maya Lin to raise awareness through science-based artworks about the present sixth mass extinction of species, connect this loss of species to habitat degradation and loss, and emphasize that by protecting and restoring habitat, we can both reduce carbon emissions and protect species.

Click on the dots and symbols in each of the subjects at the bottom of the screen to watch videos, read stories, and view timelines. Click again on the round photographs …Read More

In Frederic Church’s Ombra: Architecture in Conversation with Nature Sharp Family Gallery, Olana State Historic Site | May 12 – November 3, 2019 “In Frederic Church’s Ombra: Architecture in Conversation with Nature” showcases multimedia design concepts and installations, developed by leading architects and select artists.  As Guest Curator, Barry Bergdoll (of Columbia University and the Museum of Modern Art) invited a group of today’s most exploratory architects to respond to the transitional outdoor rooms at Olana that are so essential to the original 19th century design of Olana’s Main House. These architects were asked to examine assumptions about the …Read More