WASHINGTON DC — Albert Bierstadt's monumental landscape painting "Among the Sierra Nevada, California" (1868) is displayed at the Smithsonian American Art Museum. This grand-scale work exemplifies Bierstadt's romanticized vision of the American West, combining elements of Yosemite Falls with peaks reminiscent of the Swiss Alps. Created in the post-Civil War era, the painting was originally conceived as a "Great Picture" worthy of solo exhibition, where visitors would pay admission to view it with printed guides or opera glasses. Bierstadt crafted such dramatic Western landscapes for wealthy co

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