Resources

For Students

  • Art and Special Places/Arte y Lugares Especiales: A Bilingual Guide for Families

    This bilingual activity book, created in partnership with the Hudson Area Library, is designed for you and your family to learn more about special places like Olana and make art about special places in your own life! View it here.

  • OLANA & Columbia-Greene Community College Work Development Program

    A collaborative three-semester program provides an opportunity for Olana State Historic Site to connect and collaborate with C-GCC faculty and students throughout the academic year.

    LEARN MORE

  • On Church and Olana

    Ashberry, John
    “Historic Houses: Frederic Church at Olana; an Artist’s Fantasy on the Hudson River”
    Architectural Digest, June 1997

    Avery, Kevin J., and John Wilmerding
    Treasures from Olana: Landscapes by Frederic Edwin Church
    Cornell University Press, 2005. Purchase this book online

    Carr, Gerald L.
    Frederic Edwin Church: Catalogue Raisonné of Works of Art at Olana State Historic Site
    Cambridge University Press, 1994

    Carr, Gerald L.
    Olana Landscapes – The World of Frederic E. Church
    New York: Rizzoli, 1989

    Fels, Thomas Weston and Kevin J. Avery
    Fire and Ice; Treasures from the Photographic Collection of Frederic Church at Olana
    New York: Dahesh Museum of Art, 2002
    Purchase this book online

    Kornhauser, Elizabeth Mankin and Katherine E. Manthorne
    Fern Hunting among These Picturesque Mountains: Frederic Edwin Church in Jamaica
    Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2010
    Purchase this book online

    Ryan, James Anthony
    Frederic Church’s Olana: Architecture and Landscape as Art
    Hensonville, NY: Black Dome Press, 2001
    Purchase this book online.

    Trebilcock, Evelyn and Valerie Balint
    Glories of the Hudson: Frederic Edwin Church’s Views from Olana
    Hudson, NY: The Olana Partnership, 2009
    Purchase this book online

    Toole, Robert M.
    “The Art of the Landscape Gardener; Frederic Church at Olana”
    The Hudson River Valley Review, Vol. 21, No. 1, Autumn 2004. pg. 38-63

    Wilmerding, John
    Maine Sublime : Frederic Edwin Church’s Landscapes of Mount Desert and Mount Katahdin
    Hudson, N.Y., Ithaca, N.Y. and London: The Olana Partnership and Cornell University Press, 2012
    Purchase this book online

  • On Church and his Art

    Avery, Kevin J.
    Church’s Great Picture – The Heart of the Andes
    New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1993

    Carr, Gerald L. et al.
    Frederic Edwin Church: Romantic Landscapes and Seascapes
    New York and Houston: Adelson Galleries in Association with Michael Altman Fine Art & Advisory Services and Meredith Long & Company, 2007

    Harvey, Eleanor Jones and Gerald L. Carr.
    The Voyage of the “Icebergs:” Frederic Church’s Arctic Masterpiece
    New Haven and Dallas: Yale University Press and Dallas Museum of Art, 2002

    Howat, John K.
    Frederic Church
    New Haven: Yale University Press, 2005

    Huntington, David C.
    The Landscapes of Frederic Edwin Church: Visions of an American Era
    G. Braziller, 1966

    Kelly, Franklin
    Frederic Edwin Church and the National Landscape
    Washington and London: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1988

    Kelly, Franklin, Stephen Jay Gould, James Anthony Ryan and Debora Rindge
    Frederic Edwin Church.
    Washington and London: National Gallery of Art and Smithsonian Institution Press, 1989

    Wilton, Andrew et al.
    Frederic Church and the Landscape Oil Sketch
    New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2013

  • On Hudson River School, 19th-Century Art & Culture

    Davis, John
    The Landscape of Belief: Encountering the Holy Land in Nineteenth-century American Art and Culture
    Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1996.

    Edwards, Holly
    Noble Dreams, Wicked Pleasures: Orientalism in America, 1870-1930
    Princeton University Press/ Clark Art Institute, 2000

    Gotkin, Michael Owen and Don Freeman
    Artists’ Handmade Houses
    Abrams, 2011

    Harvey, Eleanor Jones
    The Civil War and American Art
    Washington and New Haven: Smithsonian American Art Museum and Yale University Press, 2012.

    Lewis, Tom
    The Hudson: A History
    Yale University Press, 2007

    Metropolitan Museum of Art
    American Paradise: The World of the Hudson River School
    New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1987

    Phillips, Sandra et al.
    Charmed Places: Hudson River Artists and Their Homes, Studios and Vistas
    New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1988

    Schuyler, David
    Sanctified Landscape: Writers, Artists and the Hudson River Valley, 1820-1909
    Ithica and London: Cornell University Press, 2012

    Wilton, Andrew and Tim Barringer
    American Sublime: Landscape Painting in the United States, 1820-1880
    Princeton and London: Princeton University Press and Tate Publishing, 2002

    Zukowski, Karen
    Creating the Artful Home: The Aesthetic Movement
    Layton, UT, 2006

  • For Grade Schoolers

    Locker, Thomas and Robert C Baron
    Hudson: The Story of River
    Fulcrum Publishing, 2004
    Ages 8 and up

    Talbott, Hudson
    River of Dreams: The Story of the Hudson River
    Putnam Juvenile, 2009
    For 6-8 year olds

  • Olana Coloring Book

    The Story of an Artist And His Home

    Illustrations by Mary Strever

    CLICK HERE

  • Everyday Explorer’s Guide

    Everyday Explorer’s Guide by Columbia Land Conservancy produced with local organizations is live and accessible for download on their website.

For Researchers

  • Olana Reports

    Olana staff and consultants have produced in-depth reports on various aspects of Olana.
    These unpublished reports are available for consultation.

    Turner, Suzanne
    This timeline is an excerpt from Olana’s 2015 Strategic
    Landscape Design Plan by Nelson Byrd Woltz Landscape Architects and The LAGroup. To view click here.

    Birnbaum, Charles
    Managing Change at Olana: Preliminary Recommendations for a National Historic Landmark Cultural Landscape. To read the article click here.

    Toole, Robert M.
    Historic Landscape Report, Olana State Historic Site
    December 1996 (unpublished report)
    Available for consultation by qualified researchers.
    Please contact the curatorial staff at Olana.

    Waite, John G. Associates, Architects PLLC
    Olana Historic Structure Report
    The Olana Partnership, 2001. (unpublished report)
    Available for consultation by qualified researchers.
    Please contact the curatorial staff at Olana.

    Zukowski, Karen
    The Historic Furnishings Report for Olana State Historic Site: A History of the Interiors, Thoughts on their Significance, and Recommendations for their Restoration
    NYSOPRHP/TOP, 2000. (unpublished report)
    The full document is available for consultation by qualified researchers.
    Please contact the curatorial staff at Olana.

    List of books in the Church family library.
    Available for consultation by qualified researchers.
    Please contact the curatorial staff at Olana.

    Gordon, Debra S. and James Briggs
    Olana S.H.S. Bell Tower Cornice Research Report
    NYSOPRHP, Nov. 1999

    Gordon, Debra S. and James Briggs
    Olana State Historic Site: Dining Room Cornice Research Report
    NYSOPRHP, Dec 1997

    Olana: Special Architectural Studies in support of the Olana Historic Structure Report
    NYS OPRHP & The Olana Partnership, 2002

  • Research Collection and Archives

    Olana has an extensive research collection of primary and secondary source materials. This is open to graduate students and scholars, by appointment. Researchers should email a formal request, stating the topic and purpose of your research and items that you hope to consult at Olana. Please email the Librarian/Archivist.

    Among the items available are:

    Transcripts of correspondence to and from Frederic Edwin Church

    Transcripts of correspondence to and from Isabel Church, Louis Church and other members of the Church family

    Copies of 19th-century writings about Frederic Church

    Diaries kept by Frederic Church during trips to South America and Petra

    Research files, papers, reports and database extracts on collections at Olana, including the Old Master paintings; the natural history specimens; 19th-century visitors to Olana; frames; the Melbye/Pissaro collection; the Pre-Columbian collection

    The campaign to save Olana, 1964-1967

    Campaign to protest a proposed nuclear power plant on the Hudson River, 1970s

    Images of artworks at Olana, including Church’s architectural sketches for the main house

    MA and PhD thesis on Olana, Church and related topics

    Much of Olana’s original artwork and primary source material is not kept at the site. This includes the artwork by Frederic Church not on view in the main house; 19th-century photographs; prints after Church’s paintings and other prints; drawing by other artists; bills, receipts and other financial records; the records of David Huntington and other Church scholars. A Finding Aid for this material is available at Olana, and under special circumstances these materials can be accessed. Please inquire with the curatorial staff at Olana stating specifically the material you seek, and the purpose of your research.

Other Resources

  • Essays

    A short essay on the Hudson River School of painting.
    This is an accompaniment to a PBS produced series on American songs. Click here.

    An essay on the Hudson River School of Art,
    part of the Helbrunn Timeline of Art History, produced by the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Click here.

  • Videos

    Olana Overview. Click here.

    Hanging the reproduction wallpaper in Mrs. Church’s dressing room. Click here.

    Linda Ferber, curator of The New-York Historical Society, discussing Thomas Cole and the Hudson River School. With footage at Olana. Click here.

Insider Perspective