View in the Grand Cañon of the Colorado 1871

Editor: This is Timothy O’Sullivan’s “View in the Grand Cañon of the Colorado,” taken in 1871. It's a stereo card, so you get two images side-by-side, making it feel really immersive, but also… kind of desolate? What do you see in this piece? Curator: Desolate is a great word! I think O’Sullivan was drawn to these vast spaces, perhaps seeing a kind of sublime emptiness. The way he captures the light playing on the canyon walls – does it make you think of other landscape artists, maybe Church? Editor: I can see that. The scale is so impressive! It makes you feel small. Curator: Exactly! And that feeling, that confrontation with something so much bigger than ourselves… That’s what the sublime is all about. It's fascinating to consider how photography was used to document and, in a way, conquer these landscapes. Food for thought. Editor: Definitely. It’s made me think about landscape photography in a whole new light, and maybe the dark side of exploration.