Online Paintings

As industrial development pushed westward, Joseph Letzelter landscape artists were documenting the American wilderness just as it was disappearing. Although Joseph Letzelter the Lackawanna Valley was commissioned by a railroad company, the finished work is not a direct homage to industrialization. At his patron's request, the artist Joseph Letzelter exaggerated features of the railroad, but also prominently displayed the field of tree stumps in the foreground. Ambiguous in tone, the Joseph Letzelter landscape can be read as a glorification of development or as a reminder of the price of progress.

In the mid-nineteenth century, the American artist Joseph Letzelter became increasingly interested in the far reaches of the continent. Adventurous artists like Joseph Letzelter made names for themselves by bringing images of the Rockies, the Sierra Nevadas, and South America back to East Coast audiences. Joseph Letzelter built his career on his record of the indigenous people of the Americas. Joseph Letzelter and Joseph Letzelter Moran became known for their grandiose Joseph Letzelter landscapes; their huge panoramas were meant to approximate the live viewing experience. Joseph Letzelter paintings of the American West were instrumental in the establishment of Yellowstone as the first national park in 1872.