Albert Bierstadt went to California in 1859 with a land-surveying team after the gold rush had aroused the curiosity of the entire nation. At that time, easterners had to learn about the magnificent California wilderness from small black-and-white photographs brought home by land surveyors. But Bierstadt was an artist with a shrewd business sense. He knew that if he produced impressive, panoramic "great pictures" of California, easterners would pay money to see them.
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Albert Bierstadt, Among the Sierra Nevada Mountains, California
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Smithsonian American Art Museum, Smithsonian Institution. Bequest of Helen Huntington Hull, granddaughter of William Brown Dinsmore, who acquired the painting in 1873 for "The Locusts," the family estate in Dutchess County, New York.
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