This new hardcover publication, featuring over 100 full-color images, is the culmination of The Art of Edward Lange Project. Edited and authored by Preservation Long Island curator, Lauren Brincat, and former curatorial fellow, Peter Fedoryk, the book also includes essays by Jennifer L. Anderson, Thomas Busciglio-Ritter, and Joshua M. Ruff.
Promoting Long Island: The Art of Edward Lange, 1870–1889 focuses on the life, work, and career of one of Long Island’s most prolific artists of the late nineteenth century. Edward Lange (1846–1912), a German immigrant who grew up in a family of prominent artists, publishers, and printmakers, arrived on Long Island during one of its most critical moments. For nearly two decades, he watched new industry creep into an older agrarian landscape and used his artwork to record the region’s change. With clear entrepreneurial spirit, Lange inserted himself into Long Island’s booming economy, creating advertorial content to promote businesses across the region. His images of main streets, factories, railroad depots, and hotels capture a Long Island undergoing rapid industrial and social transformation.
Promoting Long Island demonstrates the valuable insights Edward Lange’s artwork offers into a key moment in Long Island’s history from his unique perspective. By assembling broader historical context around Lange’s life and work, this book draws connections between his art and previously unassociated historical themes—from the plight of factory laborers and Black hotel workers to the unjust treatment of Native communities at the hands of real estate developers and railroad tycoons. Reconciling the carefully edited world Lange depicted with the real historical record, Promoting Long Island builds off decades-old research, study, and institutional collecting to present a more complete view of Edward Lange and the Long Island he knew and painted.
Listen to editors Lauren Brincat and Peter Fedoryk talk about the book with Chris Kretz of the Long Island History Project!
Generous funding in support of this publication has been provided by The Gerry Charitable Trust and The Decorative Arts Trust
Image Credit: Edward Lange (1846-1912). Thimble Factory, Northport, NY, 1880. Watercolor, gouache, and lead pencil on paper, 16.25 x 23.25 in. (unframed); 16 x 23 in. (framed). Preservation Long Island, Gift of Mr. Valdemar F. Jacobsen, 1991.59.
