Kansas City has a beautiful new reason to look at America with fresh eyes. American Prospects and Landscape Photography, 1839 to Today, now on view at The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, brings together 80 photographs that explore our ever-changing relationship with the natural world, from the invention of photography to the present day.
At the heart of the show are the joyful color photographs of Joel Sternfeld. Made between 1978 and 1983 with a large 8 x 10-inch camera and published in 1987 as American Prospects, they pictured the American landscape with humor, compassion and an eye for happy, serendipitous encounters, celebrating natural splendor, seasonal change and wide-open spaces. This is the first time Sternfeld’s photographs — a gift of Peggy and Bill Lyons — are on view at the Nelson-Atkins.
Around them, the galleries unfold like a family reunion of great American photographers: Carleton Watkins, William Henry Jackson, Ansel Adams, Edward Weston, Dorothea Lange, Walker Evans, Robert Frank, William Eggleston, David Maisel, Lauren Greenfield and Victoria Sambunaris, among many others. Younger visitors can keep exploring with a Photobooks program on Nov. 5 and a teacher workshop on using photography in the classroom on Dec. 10. It is a bright, thoughtful journey across the country, right here at 4525 Oak Street.
Photo: David Maisel, American Mine (Carlin, Nevada 1), The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art
