Dream of Arcadia

American Art Union, New York|Thomas Cole|James Smillie|W. E. Smith

1851 · Steel engraving · Drawings and Prints

Cole's idyllic landscape includes a temple and figures that evoke the classical past. The related oil painting was acquired by the American Art-Union after the artist's death in 1848 (now at the Denver Art Museum). The institution boasted nearly nineteen thousand subscribers at its height in 1849-50. For an annual fee of five dollars, each member received a large, finely engraved, print and was entered in a lottery to win original artworks which were exhibited at the Art-Union's Free Gallery–as was the "Dream of Arcadia." Aimed at educating the public about contemporary American art, the group's distribution network reached members in every state. This contributed to the creation of a national market for landscapes and genre paintings. The system flourished for a limited period, however, with no lottery taking place in 1851, the year that the Art-Union issued this work as part of a set of small engravings titled "Gallery of American Art, No. I."

Artist

American Art Union, New York|Thomas Cole|James Smillie|W. E. Smith

Date

1851

Medium

Steel engraving

Department

Drawings and Prints

Credit line

The Elisha Whittelsey Collection, The Elisha Whittelsey Fund, 1993