New Article in 19th-Century Art Worldwide from Alumnus Stephen Mandravelis

PhD Alumnus Stephen Mandravelis (2018) has a new article in the Autumn 2021 issue of Nineteenth-Century Art Worldwide. “The American Agriculturist: Art and Agriculture in the United States’ First Illustrated Farming Journal, 1842–78” chronicles the visual history of the American Agriculturist (1842–51; 1853–present; New York City), the first farming periodical in the United States to widely embrace artistic engravings. Long recognized as one of the most popular and influential periodicals in the mid-nineteenth-century United States, the Agriculturist’s efforts to cultivate rural artistic taste has largely escaped investigation. This article recounts the development of the farming journal’s interest in art—reproductions of paintings, original compositions, and other pictorial images— and explores its careful positioning as a mediator between the spheres of practical agriculture and fine art.