Montgomery’s History at The Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts

Friday, 04 January 2008 21:41

Montgomery, AL – On Tuesday, January 15, 2008 at 10 a.m., View of Montgomery, a large oil-on-canvas depicting the blooming city of Montgomery during the last half of the 19th century, will be gifted to the Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts from the Landmarks Foundation, where it has been housed since 1971. The Landmarks Foundation acquired the painting from the Alabama State Chamber of Commerce during the 1971 restoration of the Ordeman House located in Montgomery’s Old Alabama Town. The home has since been converted to a small museum featuring one of the best collections of American decorative arts in the Southeast. Its highlights include 19th century furniture, ceramics, artwork, and textiles.

In 1973, the painting traveled to New York to be restored and stabilized under the auspices of noted art conservator, Gustav Berger. The painting is unsigned, thus the actual artist remains unconfirmed, but many art museum curators and researchers have speculated about its creator.

View of Montgomery  captures the excitement and hustle and bustle of a growing town energized by becoming the capital city of Alabama. Larger than life city figures appear in the foreground along with farmers and animals working in the adjacent fields.  Some early landmarks are recognizable in the background of the downtown area. View of Montgomery’s uniqueness of place has landed it as a feature in many publications such as Southern Folk Art  by Cynthia Rubin of the American Museum of Folk Art and Antiques Magazine.

The painting will be on view at the Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts in its permanent collection gallery.

The Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts is open Tuesday through Saturday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.; Thursday from 10 a.m. to 9 p.m.; and Sunday Noon to 5 p.m. Admission is free and donations are welcome. For more information, call the MMFA at 334.240.4333 or visit the website at www.mmfa.org .

The MMFA, a department of the City of Montgomery, is supported by funds from the City and County of Montgomery and the Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts Association. Programs are made possible, in part, by grants from the Alabama State Council on the Arts and the National Endowment for the Arts.