Grand Teton National Park to Present Artwork from Harrison Crandall's Private Archive

Date: July 15, 2011
Contact: Jenny Anzelmo-Sarles, 307.739.3431

July 15, 2011

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Grand Teton National Park will host a special lecture by Dr. Ken Barrick titled, "Harrison Crandall: Historic Images from the Personal Archives of the Official Grand Teton National Park Photographer" at 7:30 p.m. on Wednesday, July 20 in the Craig Thomas Discovery and Visitor Center auditorium. This program is free and open to the public.

Harrison R. Crandall was the first official Grand Teton National Park photographer and served as a resident artist from the 1920s until the 1960s. Selected historic photographs from the Crandall private archive will be presented to the public for the first time, including iconic views of the Grand Teton landscape, cowgirls and cowboys, and American Indians.

These historic extraordinary images were selected from more than 1,100 Crandall negatives that are being graciously gifted to the Grand Teton National Park archives by Harrison's daughter and son-in-law, Quita and Herb Pownall. Please join the Pownalls and park staff in celebration of the first showing of these rare and historically important photographs.

Barrick, an associate professor of geography at the University of Alaska-Fairbanks, has been doing research in the Rocky Mountains for 25 years, including studies in Yellowstone and Grand Teton national parks. For nearly 10 years, Barrick has done extensive research on Harrison Crandall's contributions to the art of national parks.

Harrison "Hank" Crandall homesteaded in Jackson Hole in 1922. He was a fine-art painter, photographer, early concessionaire and fervent supporter of Grand Teton National Park until his death in 1970. In fact, he was the first resident artist in the valley and ran two Crandall Studios for decades: one at Jenny Lake (now the Jenny Lake Visitor Center) and the other at the former town of Moran near the shore of Jackson Lake. Crandall is best known for his landscape photos and oil paintings of the Teton Range, hand-painted wildflower photographs, and images of ranch life in Jackson Hole-including cowboys and cowgirls.