Opening Hours
Daily: 10 A.M.–5 P.M.
Closed on Tuesdays
1151 Oxford Road
San Marino, CA 91108
Karen Halverson
Exhibitions
1 of 3
Karen Halverson, Shafer Trail, near Moab, Utah from the Downstream series, 1994–95. Archival pigment print; 24 x 20 in. Courtesy of the Artist.
Karen Halverson, Davis Gulch, Lake Powell, Utah from the Downstream series, 1994-1995. Archival pigment print. 24 x 20 in. Courtesy of the Artist.
Karen Halverson, Boulder Beach, Lake Mead, Nevada, from the Downstream series, 1994–95, archival pigment print, 20 x 24 in., courtesy of the artist.
Past eventSat., May 30, 2009, 12 a.m.–Tue., Sept. 29, 2009, 11:59 p.m.
The Susan and Stephen Chandler Wing of the Virginia Steele Scott Galleries of American Art
The exhibition features 24 works from Halverson's Downstream series as well as a sampling of images from The Huntington's historic holdings related to the Colorado River region.
To celebrate the expansion and reinstallation of the Virginia Steele Scott Galleries of American Art, The Huntington presents an exhibition of works from American photographer Karen Halverson’s Colorado River series, on view May 30 through Sept. 28, 2009. “Downstream: Colorado River Photographs of Karen Halverson” will be on display in the Scott Galleries’ Susan and Stephen Chandler Wing, inaugurating a new changing exhibition space that will highlight photography and works on paper that, because of the fragile nature of the medium, cannot be placed on permanent display.
The exhibition will feature 24 works from Halverson’s Downstream series as well as a sampling of images from The Huntington’s historic holdings related to the Colorado River region, including photographs from John Wesley Powell’s pioneering expedition down the Colorado in 1871 and a snapshot album compiled in 1940 by Mildred Baker, one of the first women to successfully navigate the river from Green River, Wyo., to Boulder (now Hoover) Dam.
Halverson (b. 1941) says she woke one wintry morning in 1994 convinced that she needed to photograph the Colorado River. An accomplished landscape photographer who had already spent 20 years exploring the American West, she embarked on a two-year encounter with the vast terrain along the river’s serpentine route.
"In my travels along the Colorado,
sometimes I find beauty,
sometimes desecration,
often a perplexing and
absurd combination. "
K A R E N H A L V E R S O N
The desire to explain, understand, and experience the 1,700-mile river—which originates in Wyoming and Colorado before converging in Utah toward its terminus in Mexico—has exerted a powerful influence on a long line of explorers, scientists, thrill seekers, writers, artists, and photographers. Once largely wild, the modern river has been tamed by dams built to slake the American West’s thirst for water and power. Today the river’s reservoirs supply 30 million people.
