Smithsonian American Art Museum
The Signal Fire
Ralph Albert Blakelock, born New York City 1847-died Elizabethtown, NY 1919 · 1885-1890
Ralph Albert Blakelock traveled the American West between 1869 and 1872 to sketch landscapes and native peoples. After he returned, he continued to paint western images inspired from the trip. In The Signal Fire a glowing moon rises above an American Indian perched on the edge of a cliff. The fire, crackling away below him, sends waves of wispy smoke in the air, possibly signaling someone on the tip of the mountain in the distance.
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