Julian Rix, (1850-1903)

Cloud-Burst (Cañon of the Upper Missouri) 13 1/2 x 21in framed 17 x 25in

Cloud-Burst (Cañon of the Upper Missouri)
signed 'Rix' (lower left)
oil and graphite on illustration board
13 1/2 x 21in
framed 17 x 25in
Painted circa 1888.

Provenance
Private collection, Pennsylvania.

Literature
John Muir, ed., Picturesque California: the Rocky Mountains and the Pacific slope; California, Oregon, Nevada, Washington, Alaska, Montana, Idaho, Arizona, Colorado, Utah, Wyoming, etc., vols. 9 - 10, New York: J. Dewing Pub. Co., 1888, no. CV, p. 417, xii (full page photogravure).

San Francisco publisher James Dewing set out to make Picturesque California the most comprehensive travelogue of the West of his time. It was originally sold by subscription in thirty volumes and featured over 800 illustrations by leading Western landscape artists, such as Albert Bierstadt and Julian Rix, reproduced in a variety of print processes.

The present work depicts the 'grand cañon' of the Upper Missouri River in Montana. 'In this cañon for fifteen or twenty miles the Montana Central Railroad has blasted its way along the jagged rocks. The scenery is as beautiful as that of the Grand Black Cañon of Colorado. The Kootenay country is a land of wonders. Some of the most rugged mountains on the continent are found there.'1

1 John Muir, ed., Picturesque California: the Rocky Mountains and the Pacific slope; California, Oregon, Nevada, Washington, Alaska, Montana, Idaho, Arizona, Colorado, Utah, Wyoming, etc., vol. 9, New York: J. Dewing Pub. Co., 1888, p. 416-417.