Boston Athenæum

March 3, 2019 at the Boston Athenæum. Topographers, illustrators, and painter-printmakers explored and created images of the Grand Canyon, and the evolution of these genres parallels the history of American printmaking in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Beginning with geological studies and including prints for tourists and collectors, printmakers have approached the Canyon from the vantage point of line, tone, and pattern. In so doing, they made significant contributions to imaging one of the United States’ most renowned geological monuments, yet their works have not been extensively studied like those of painters and photographers. Sublime Impressions: Prints and Printmakers of the Grand Canyon traces the history of printmaking in the Grand Canyon from the topographical images of the first explorers to the abstracted works of twentieth-century modernists to show how a medium changed the way the Grand Canyon was represented and, thus, the public’s perception of it.