Trout Lake, Colorado (Lago Trout, Colorado)

Hamilton Hamilton, American, 1847 - 1928

1879

painting

oil on canvas

Museum purchase with funds provided by the Douglas C. Summers Memorial Fund

1988.2

© Phoenix Art Museum. All rights reserved. Photo by Ken Howie.

American and Western American

No

With the Louisiana Purchase of 1803, the continent opened west of the Mississippi, and Americans pondered what the immense wilderness might offer. Christian beliefs resulted in Manifest Destiny, regarded as a God-given right to expand western civilization across the North American continent. In 1873, Hamilton made a sketching expedition to Colorado, where he was inspired by the sublime scale of the Rocky Mountains. He returned East with 47 paintings, and their acceptance at the Philadelphia Centennial Exposition in 1876 established his reputation. Trout Lake is located near Telluride, and is surrounded by peaks up to 14,000 feet high.