New Book Finds Frederic Church's Greatest Art Underfoot at Olana

April 11 | Hudson, NY | 4pm | $15, free for members

Olana is most often experienced as a view, that famous panorama of the Hudson River from Church's hilltop house. But writer Annik LaFarge argues that the real masterwork isn't the house or the paintings made inside it. It's the landscape itself: the seven carriage roads Church designed and built across the property in the 1860s through 1880s, which she has spent years walking, researching, and writing about. On April 11, she comes to Olana to discuss her new book Composing Olana: A Journey on Foot Through Frederic Church's Greatest Work of Art in an event that moves from the Frederic Church Center out onto the grounds.

The book is laid out as a series of walks along those seven carriage roads, unpacking the history of everything visible in the landscape (and much that isn't) from the Ice Age geology that shaped it to the artists and conservationists who fought to preserve it. Along the way, LaFarge covers lesser-known women painters of the Hudson River School, the Native peoples who lived here before European arrival, Church's mentorship under Thomas Cole, and his largely uncelebrated contributions to the creation of Central Park and the preservation of Niagara Falls.

The book was published in March to coincide with the 200th anniversary of Church's birth. It's modeled on LaFarge's earlier "On the High Line," which used the same walk-as-structure approach to map a very different piece of designed landscape in New York City.

The April 11 program begins with a short presentation at the Frederic Church Center, followed by an outdoor walk along the carriage roads with Olana's Landscape Curator Mark Prezorski, and concludes with a wine and cheese reception.