
Frederic Edwin ChurchVereinigte Staaten, 1826–1900Darf man es sehen?
New York City, Vereinigte Staaten
Öffentlich ausgestellt. Wer dafür bürgt, steht unten.
The Parthenon is a large 1871 painting by American artist Frederic Edwin Church which is in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City.
Church visited Greece in 1869 and spent several weeks in Athens, where he made numerous studies of the ruins of the Parthenon that later served as the basis for the work. In 1871 a commission from the financier and philanthropist Morris K. Jesup finally allowed Church to begin work on his "big Parthenon".
The painting is on view at the Metropolitan Museum's Gallery 760.
winter 1868 – 1869
A winter in Rome
Back in southern Europe by summer, the Churches wintered in Rome among artist friends, including Sanford Robinson Gifford and Jervis McEntee. There Church learned fresco painting and collected Old Master paintings, though on the whole Europe interested him far less than it did most American artists.
April 1869
Athens and the Parthenon; home again
Leaving his family in Rome, Church spent two weeks in Athens, where the Parthenon so impressed him that he sketched and painted it energetically; this visit ended the journey. In May the Churches left Rome and, by way of Paris and England, were home by the end of June.
1870
Begins building Olana
Before the journey Church had bought 18 acres on the hilltop above his farm for its views of the Hudson and the Catskills, and in 1870 he began building a Persian-inspired mansion there. Richard Morris Hunt was consulted early on and the architect Calvert Vaux completed the project, but Church made his own architectural sketches and laid out roads, writing that he could make more and better landscapes this way than with canvas and paint in the studio.
1870
A founding trustee of the Metropolitan Museum
Church became one of the founding trustees of the Metropolitan Museum of Art and remained one until his death.
30. April 1870
Son born: Louis P. Church
summer 1872
The family moves into Olana
The Churches moved into their new hilltop house; the eclectic building incorporated many ideas gathered on his travels, and in the last twenty years of his life Church devoted much of his energy to Olana.