{
"data": {
"id": 162312,
"accession_number": "2002.45",
"share_license_status": "CC0",
"tombstone": "Sand Dunes, Carson Desert, Nevada, 1867. Timothy H. O'Sullivan (American, 1840\u20131882). Albumen print from wet collodion negative; image: 19.7 x 27 cm (7 3/4 x 10 5/8 in.); mounted: 45.7 x 59.4 cm (18 x 23 3/8 in.); matted: 50.8 x 61 cm (20 x 24 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, John L. Severance Fund, 2002.45",
"current_location": null,
"title": "Sand Dunes, Carson Desert, Nevada",
"creation_date": "1867",
"creation_date_earliest": 1867,
"creation_date_latest": 1867,
"artists_tags": [
"male"
],
"culture": [
"America"
],
"technique": "albumen print from wet collodion negative",
"support_materials": [],
"department": "Photography",
"collection": "Photography",
"type": "Photograph",
"measurements": "Image: 19.7 x 27 cm (7 3/4 x 10 5/8 in.); Mounted: 45.7 x 59.4 cm (18 x 23 3/8 in.); Matted: 50.8 x 61 cm (20 x 24 in.)",
"dimensions": {
"image": {
"height": 0.197,
"height_inch": 7,
"height_inch_fraction": 0.75,
"width": 0.27,
"width_inch": 10,
"width_inch_fraction": 0.625
},
"mounted": {
"height": 0.457,
"height_inch": 18,
"height_inch_fraction": 0.0,
"width": 0.594,
"width_inch": 23,
"width_inch_fraction": 0.375
},
"matted": {
"height": 0.508,
"height_inch": 20,
"height_inch_fraction": 0.0,
"width": 0.61,
"width_inch": 24,
"width_inch_fraction": 0.0
}
},
"state_of_the_work": null,
"edition_of_the_work": null,
"copyright": null,
"inscriptions": [
{
"inscription": "imprinted in black ink on recto: \"U.S./ ENGINEER DEPARTMENT/ GEOLOGICAL EXPLORATION/ FORTIETH PARALLEL\"; \"T.H.O'Sullivan Photographer\"; \"No. 59\" (highlighted in black)\"; in black ink on mount: \"Sand Dunes near Sand\"; in pencil on mount: \"K1130\"",
"inscription_translation": null,
"inscription_remark": null,
"sortorder": null
}
],
"exhibitions": {
"current": [
{
"id": 184646,
"title": "Charles Isaacs and Carol Nigro Collection of American Photography",
"description": "Charles Isaacs and Carol Nigro Collection of American Photography. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (April 26-September 10, 2003).",
"opening_date": "2003-04-26T00:00:00"
},
{
"id": 221701,
"title": "The Modern West: American Landscapes, 1890-1950",
"description": "The Modern West: American Landscapes, 1890-1950. Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Houston, TX (organizer) (October 29, 2006-January 20, 2007); Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, CA (March 4-June 3, 2007).",
"opening_date": "2006-10-29T00:00:00"
}
],
"legacy": []
},
"provenance": [
{
"description": "(Charles Isaacs Photographs, Inc., New York, NY)",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": [],
"date": null,
"sortorder": 1
},
{
"description": "The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": [],
"date": "June 3, 2002",
"sortorder": 2
}
],
"find_spot": null,
"related_works": [],
"former_accession_numbers": [],
"did_you_know": "O\u2019Sullivan took this while on a government expedition analyzing the future path of the transcontinental railroad.",
"early_education_description": null,
"artlens_description": null,
"description": "This noontime scene conveys a desolate place discovered by a lonely explorer. The artist chose a vantage point and framing that blocked the horizon and showed a single wagon\u2014the former Civil War ambulance that he converted into a portable darkroom\u2014and only two sets of footprints. However, over the previous 25 years, more than 165,000 people had passed near here on their way to California.",
"external_resources": {
"wikidata": [
"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q79986320"
],
"internet_archive": [
"https://archive.org/details/clevelandart-2002.45-sand-dunes-carson-de"
]
},
"citations": [
{
"citation": "Cleveland Museum of Art. The CMA Companion: A Guide to the Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2014.",
"page_number": "Mentioned and reproduced: P. 304-305",
"url": ""
}
],
"url": "https://clevelandart.org/art/2002.45",
"images": {
"annotation": null,
"web": {
"url": "https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/2002.45/2002.45_web.jpg",
"width": "1207",
"height": "893",
"filesize": "595592",
"filename": "2002.45_web.jpg"
},
"print": {
"url": "https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/2002.45/2002.45_print.jpg",
"width": "3400",
"height": "2516",
"filesize": "4984326",
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},
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"alternate_images": [
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"date_created": "2006-12-19T15:33:21",
"annotation": ""
}
],
"creditline": "John L. Severance Fund",
"image_credit": null,
"sketchfab_id": null,
"sketchfab_url": null,
"gallery_donor_text": null,
"athena_id": 162312,
"creators": [
{
"id": 757,
"description": "Timothy H. O'Sullivan (American, 1840\u20131882)",
"extent": null,
"qualifier": null,
"role": "artist",
"biography": "Timothy H. O'Sullivan American, b. Ireland?, 1840-1882\r\n\r\nAn important photographer of the American Civil War, Timothy O'Sullivan worked first for Mathew Brady, then Alexander Gardner in their Washington, D.C., studios, producing some of the war's best known images. The son of Irish immigrants, whether O'Sullivan was born in New York or Ireland remains unresolved. His photographs appear in Gardner's classic volumes, Photographic Incidents of the War (1863) and Photographic Sketchbook of the War (1866).\r\n\tAfter the war's end, O'Sullivan became a photographer for government land surveys, working from 1867-69 for Clarence King's expedition along the 40th parallel in Utah, Nevada, and California. In 1870 he was photographer for Thomas O. Selfridge's survey of the Isthmus of Darien to determine the path of the Panama Canal. That same year he was hired by Lieutenant George M. Wheeler to accompany his military surveys of the land west of the 100th meridian and expeditions to California, Nevada, and Arizona. O'Sullivan returned to work for King in 1872 before joining Wheeler again in 1873. Briefly a partner in the Washington photographic firm of Armstrong and Company, he left in 1880 to become chief photographer for the U.S. Treasury, replacing his friend and colleague Lewis Emory Walker.\r\n\tThroughout his work, O'Sullivan employed a spare, restrained style that appeals to the modern eye. It is perhaps significant that he remained in the employ of the government on projects in which objectivity was paramount. By contrast, works by his peers often seem influenced by the romanticism implicit in the enterprises, mining, development, and the building of railroads, that they were hired to record. T.W.F.",
"name_in_original_language": null,
"birth_year": "1840",
"death_year": "1882",
"use_in_caption": true,
"include_extent": false,
"weight": 1
}
],
"legal_status": "accessioned",
"accession_date": "2002-06-03T00:00:00",
"sortable_date": 1867,
"date_added_to_oa": null,
"date_text": "1867",
"collapse_artists": false,
"on_loan": false,
"recently_acquired": false,
"record_type": "object",
"conservation_statement": null,
"has_conservation_images": false,
"cover_accession_number": null,
"is_nazi_era_provenance": false,
"impression": null,
"alternate_titles": [],
"is_highlight": true,
"updated_at": "2026-05-29 08:25:46.994000"
}
}