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Niagara

Louis Rémy Mignot

American Art

From the eighteenth century on, Niagara Falls was among the most iconic symbols of American might, pride, and cultural identity. Its meaning shifts in this painting by Louis Rémy Mignot, a Southerner and Confederate sympathizer forced to abandon his rising New York career upon the outbreak of the Civil War. Although the composition was likely inspired by his friend Frederic Church’s famous Niagara (1857), Mignot pointedly chose an atypical view, facing the Canadian, rather than the American, side of the falls. He made one last sketching excursion to Niagara before his departure in 1862 for London, where he completed the work.
MEDIUM Oil on canvas
DATES 1866
DIMENSIONS frame: 61 1/2 × 104 1/4 × 4 1/2 in. (156.2 × 264.8 × 11.4 cm) 48 3/4 x 91 1/2 in. (123.8 x 232.4 cm)  (show scale)
SIGNATURE Signed lower right on rock: "M. / 70"
COLLECTIONS American Art
ACCESSION NUMBER 1993.118
CREDIT LINE Gift of Arthur S. Fairchild
MUSEUM LOCATION This item is not on view
CAPTION Louis Rémy Mignot (American, 1831-1870). Niagara, 1866. Oil on canvas, frame: 61 1/2 × 104 1/4 × 4 1/2 in. (156.2 × 264.8 × 11.4 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Arthur S. Fairchild, 1993.118 (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 1993.118_SL1.jpg)
IMAGE overall, 1993.118_SL1.jpg. Brooklyn Museum photograph
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