Imagined Landscape with Ruined Temple
date: label: Date
content: 1868–69
name: label: Artist
content: Frederic Edwin Church, American, 1826–1900
notes: label: Catalogue Status
content: Research in Progress
label: Description
content: Landscape sketch showing an imagined view of an ancient, ruined temple on a plateau in an extremely rugged, mountainous landscape that is likely a composite view of scenery from Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Greece, and the European Alps. In the foreground at right, a tall, dark, rough, and rocky outcropping frames the scene. Interestingly, the darker hue of brown pigment here was used by the artist to paint over an ancient temple facade with two-and-a-half columns. Its entablature (above) and stylobate (or base, below) are visible, having not been fully covered. The linear elements of the columns are still discernable beneath the paint. In the middle distance at left, a ruined temple with a four-column facade is situated upon a flat prominence or plateau. Its cliffside at center left is colored red and orange by the light of the setting sun. A lush, green, and narrow valley is visible at center that extends into the background, where a range of immense and towering mountains forms a high, undulating horizon. The tallest peak, at upper left, is snow-capped while its abrupt mountainsides also catch the sunset light. Above, rosy clouds hang in an otherwise blue-green sky.
place: label: probably made in
content: Greece
setName: label: See more items in
content: Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum Collection
label: See more items in
content: Drawings, Prints, and Graphic Design Department
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: Gift of Louis P. Church
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum
identifier: label: Accession Number
content: 1917-4-527
objectType: label: Type
content: landscapes
label: Object Name
content: Drawing
label: Type
content: Drawing
objectRights: label: Restrictions & Rights
content: CC0
physicalDescription: label: Medium
content: Brush and oil on thin, tan paperboard
label: Dimensions
content: 33 × 51 cm (13 × 20 1/16 in.)