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One hundred years ago the Panama Canal linked east to west, opening for the first time in history a water passage between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans.
Now the Panama Canal Expansion Project, slated for completion in 2016, will open a new water lane to more and larger ships.
Celebrating today’s Panama project, Oh Panama! looks back to the determined and spirited efforts of the architects and crews who accomplished the 1914 canal that was captured in paintings by Jonas Lie.
The paintings are on loan to the Hudson River Museum from the West Point Museum Collection, United States Military Academy.
Norwegian-born painter Jonas Lie (1880-1940) inspired by a motion picture documentary of the construction of the canal visited the Panama Canal Zone for three months in 1913.
He was enthralled by the feats of engineering required to dig the Culebra Cut, as well as the sublime visual qualities of the massive trench being carved across the Isthmus of Panama.
Working in the intense tropical heat, he produced oil sketches and drawings and took careful notes on the technical aspects of the canal construction.
The 30 known pictures he made of Panama are lively and colorful, capturing the spirit of that endeavor as well as its heroic quality and monumental scale.
Organized by the Hudson River Museum and James A. Michener Art Museum, Oh Panama! Jonas Lie Paints the Panama Canal is curated by Kirsten M. Jensen, Senior Curator of Exhibitions at the Michener Art Museum and Bartholomew F. Bland, Deputy Director of the Hudson River Museum.
The Hudson River Museum is located at 511 Warburton Ave., Yonkers, N.Y.
For more information, call (914) 963-4550.
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