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Indepth Arts News:
"The Grand Moving PANORAMA of Pilgrim's Progress"
1999-11-04 until 2000-01-02
Portland Museum of Art
Portland, ME,
USA United States of America
Prior to the advent of motion
pictures, large painted canvases
traveled to communities
throughout the nation as a form
of entertainment. Recently
rediscovered, The Grand Moving
Panorama of Pilgrim's Progress,
painted in 1850-51, depicts John
Bunyan's religious allegory
Pilgrim's Progress. The
Panorama of Bunyan's Pilgrim's
Progress is making its first
return to Portland in 154 years.
In its entirety, Panorama of Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress was an eight-foot high by
850-foot long canvas mounted on wooden rollers that unfurled the painting. Each
viewing of the panorama was approximately two hours long and featured music and a
lecturer as a tour guide. Shown in meeting houses and barns, the panorama is believed
to have been viewed by more than 100,000 people during its first year. Painted by
theatrical painters Joseph Kyle and Jacob Dallas, many of the compositions in the
panorama are attributed to leading artists of the day, including Frederic Church, Jasper
Cropsey, and Daniel Huntington. Unlike the detailed style of easel painting of the time,
panoramas were painted with large brush strokes in bright colors meant to be viewed
from 30 feet away.
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