The Americas 4 items

1. Saint John's Antigua/From Otto's

Creator:
J. Johnson, drawings; T. Fielding, C. Bentley, G. Reeve and others, engravers
Description:
Hand-colored aquatint From A Series of Views in the West Indies. Engraved from Drawings Taken Recently in the Islands, with Letter Press Explanations Made from Actual Observations London: Underwood, Smith, Elder & Co., 1827-1829
Curatorial Notes:
Johnson’s views of the West Indies is described as “made from actual observations,” and he certainly captures the warm glow of the sun, serene sea, and quiet city center. Like other views of the picturesque abroad, the tension between beauty and terror comes less from the image itself and more from what is and is not included in the painted pictures — pastoral sheep and delicate clouds versus the brutality of the Antigua sugar plantations.
Photography:
David Kelly Crow

2. Sandy Point, St. Kitts

Creator:
John Herbert Caddy (1801-1883), drawings; Charles Hunt, J. Harris, Newn Fielding, W. Westall, W., J. Harris, engravers
Description:
Hand-colored aquatint From Scenery of the Windward and Leeward Islands London: R. Ackermann, 1837
Curatorial Notes:
Illustrator John Herbert Caddy was a Canadian soldier, engineer, teacher, and artist who traveled the globe while serving in the Royal Artillery. He specialized in landscape and rarely included people in his compositions. This view of St. Kitts, one of his many homes over the years, seems divided in two: the left sky bright and blue, the right darker and more cloudy as if Caddy sat down at either the beginning or the end of a rain storm to catch the disappearing or emerging sunshine.
Photography:
David Kelly Crow

3. San Augustin de las Cuevas

Creator:
Daniel Thomas Egerton
Description:
Hand-colored lithograph From Egerton's Views in Mexico: Being a Series of Twelve Coloured Plates London: D. T. Egerton, 1840
Curatorial Notes:
The scene mixes rustic terrain together with the community activity: two opposite poles that the picturesque aspired to put together. Against the backdrop (mountains, big sky, blue river) hundreds in indigenous dress are depicted attending the annual festival at San Agustín de las Cuevas (then south of Mexico City). The artist spent his latter years in Mexico where he died in April 1842.
Photography:
Princeton University Library Digital Imaging Studio

4. Idol at Copan

Creator:
Frederick Catherwood (1799-1854)
Description:
Lithograph From Views of Ancient Monuments in Central America, Chiapas, and Yucatan London; Catherwood, 1844
Curatorial Notes:
A trained architect, Frederick Catherwood teamed up with the American travel writer, John Lloyd Stephens, and journeyed twice to Central America during 1839-1842 intending to publish pictures and narrative of little known but fabled areas. This image is one of immense grandeur, but conventionally it could not be considered sublime, because such were intended to signal divine awesomeness. Maya ruins were outside the Christian register, thus termed “Idol” by Catherwood, making its context that of curiosity, not reverence.
Photography:
Princeton University Library Digital Imaging Studio