Nineteenth-century landscape painter Frederic Edwin Church first traveled to Maine in 1850, inspired by a portfolio of drawings by his teacher Thomas Cole, founder of the Hudson River School. During the next few decades, Church visited the Maine coast and rocky islands near Mount Desert and trekked inland focusing on the area around Mount Katahdin. Maine provided sensational sunsets, robust waves crashing on rocky shores, and an abundance of wilderness arousing the dramatic vitality of nature that Church’s paintings embody. Organized by Olana Traveling Exhibitions and curated by John Wilmerding, Sarofim Professor Emeritus of American Art and Chair of the Department of Art and Archeology at Princeton University, the exhibition will focus on 23 of Church’s small oil sketches of Maine’s two most majestic natural landmarks.This exhibition was organized by The Olana Partnership, Hudson, NY, and New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation, Albany, NY. Corporate sponsorship provided by MEMIC.