The Olana Partnership opens "Frederic Church: Global Artist" on May 17 at Olana State Historic Site in Hudson, New York, commemorating the 200th anniversary of Frederic Church's birth (1826–1900). The exhibition brings together monumental oil paintings, drawings, oil sketches, and photographs from Church's global travels, with loans from major institutions including the Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum, The New York Historical, and the Terra Foundation for American Art. It is organized by Elizabeth Kornhauser, Tim Barringer, and Jennifer Raab, and is part of the broader Frederic Church 200 initiative.
The exhibition matters because it repositions Frederic Church as a global artist whose work engaged with scientific and political issues of his era, challenging the traditional view of him as merely a regional American landscape painter. By uniting works from his travels across South America, Europe, the Middle East, and Mexico, the show and its accompanying book offer fresh scholarly insights that redefine Church's significance for contemporary audiences. It also highlights Olana, the artist's home, as a product of his worldwide entanglements, reinforcing the relevance of 19th-century American art in a global context.