ART IN THE AMERICAN SOUTH: WORKS FROM THE OGDEN COLLECTION, by Randolph Delehanty (Louisiana State University Press, 292 pages, $59.95).
This beautiful, large-format book examines the visual arts in the American South from the beginning of the eighteenth century to the present. The examples considered form the magnificent Ogden Collection of Southern Art, which was amassed by Roger Houston Ogden of New Orleans and is housed in that city’s Ogden Museum of Southern Art. This collection contains more than 1,200 paintings, drawings, prints, ceramics, sculptures, and photographs by some 420artists. For his book–which is divided into seven sections: landscapes; marine paintings; southern flora and fauna; still lifes; rural and urban scenes; portraits; and spirit, soul, and signs–Delehanty traces artistic trends in Southern art and showcases 237 works, including Sunset on St. John’s River by George HerbertMcCord (1848-1909), Falcon–Falconer by John Drayton (1710-79), Tenant Farmer by Marie Atchinson Hull (1890-1980), and Iris Field Near Newcomb Greenhouse by Ellsworth Woodward (1861-1939).