An earlier post on this blog - The Hudson River School- explains the importance of Thomas Cole as the leading light of the Hudson River School and outlines his critical stance towards what he regarded as the wanton destruction of the American landscape by greedy speculators. Two related exhibitions currently on display at London’s National … Continue reading Thomas Cole and Ed Ruscha: Two Prophecies of American Decay
Category: Progress
Hidden in Havana
In Niagara: Two Centuries of Changing Attitudes, 1697-1901 (the catalogue that accompanied the Corcoran Gallery 1985 exhibition surveying historical artistic responses to Niagara Falls), art historian Jeremy Elwell Adamson tells us that Regis painted four wintertime Niagaras. He explains that the most famous of these, and one of the most popular paintings of the Falls … Continue reading Hidden in Havana
Human Accumulations: Documenting Niagara Falls
For Human Accumulations Alan Gignoux and Jenny Christensson are documenting the Niagara Falls of today – the waterfalls and the two cities of Niagara Falls in New York and Canada - in photographs and words in the form of interviews. Once, at the heart of an ancient forest, there was a beautiful waterfall, whose … Continue reading Human Accumulations: Documenting Niagara Falls
Voices of Niagara: Jim Hill, Niagara Parks Commission, Ontario
My name is Jim Hill, I’m the Senior Manager of Heritage, for the Niagara Parks Commission. Our park has been around since 1885 and we’re an agency of the Province of Ontario. Our mandate is to preserve the nature and heritage along the Niagara corridor on the Canadian side of the river. When we were … Continue reading Voices of Niagara: Jim Hill, Niagara Parks Commission, Ontario
Voices of Niagara: Paul Dyster, Mayor of Niagara Falls, New York
In a city that was once an industrial power, that’s lost half of its population over the course of the last 50 or 60 years, economic development is always going to be a great challenge. There’s a certain irony in that since this was one of the first areas in North America to industrialise at … Continue reading Voices of Niagara: Paul Dyster, Mayor of Niagara Falls, New York
Failed Utopias and Dystopian Futures
Gillette's was not the only Utopian plan for the Falls - also in the 1890's William T. Love attempted to raise money to construct Model City, an urban development scheme designed around a canal and a hydroelectric plant, with housing for more than 1 million people. Love's plans collapsed after his investors backed out as … Continue reading Failed Utopias and Dystopian Futures
Voices of Niagara: Lou Paonessa, Robert Moses Niagara Power Project
We interviewed Lou Paonessa about the history of hydro-electric power at Niagara Falls and the Robert Moses Niagara Power Project, New York State's biggest energy producer. "My name is Lou Paonessa, I work in community relations at the New York Power Authority. We like to say that this is the birthplace of hydro-electricity here at … Continue reading Voices of Niagara: Lou Paonessa, Robert Moses Niagara Power Project
Niagara as a Focus for the Future
Niagara gripped the imagination of not only travellers and writers, but also of engineers and entrepreneurs. Many of these “envisioned the fall’s industrial and economic potential as limitless” and “they imagined a colossal, utopian future that would inevitably result from the relentless human drive to subdue and transform nature.” (McGreevy) In his book Imagining Niagara … Continue reading Niagara as a Focus for the Future
Niagara Falls, 1855
This painting by Regis of Niagara Falls, now in the High Museum in Atlanta, provided the inspiration for our visit to the falls and will be the starting point for Alan's creative response to this location. It is a delicately coloured summertime view of the falls with little sign of human intervention aside from the … Continue reading Niagara Falls, 1855
Human Accumulations 