Corcoran Gallery of Art: American Paintings to 1945

This landmark publication--which comprises the present volume and a companion online component featuring exhaustive documentation on individual paintings-is the first to authoritatively catalogue and interpret one of the finest and most renowned collections of historic American paintings in the world. The two-part publication offers both art historians and the general public access to the most comprehensive and up-to-date research on the museum's American paintings, while highlighting the Corcoran's commitment to the study and display of its permanent collection. America's first art museum, the Corcoran Gallery of Art was founded in 1869 by the wealthy Washington, D.C. banker and philanthropist William Wilson Corcoran (1798--1888). The museum was established from the private collection. Corcoran began in about 1850, and since that time its American paintings collection has grown to more than five hundred works dating from 1718 to 1945. These holdings include a remarkable number of iconic works in all genres of American painting. This list includes Samuel F.B. Morse's The House of Representatives (1822); Rembrandt Peak's Washington before Yorktown (1824--25); Thomas Cole's The Depar