Composing Olana

A Journey on Foot Through an American Landscape

Annik LaFarge

Pages: 208

Illustrations: 100 b/w illustrations

Fordham University Press
Fordham University Press

This book can be opened with

Glassboxx eBooks and audiobooks can be opened on phones, tablets, iOS and Android devices

(Pre-order)
Paperback / softback
ISBN: 9781531513078
Published: 03 March 2026
$24.95
Available to order on 03 November 2025
(Pre-order)
eBook (ePub)
ISBN: 9781531513085
Published: 03 March 2026
$23.99
Available to order on 03 November 2025

The first and only book devoted to the landscape Frederic Church designed at Olana – what he considered his greatest work of art – timed to coincide with the bicentennial of his birth

Modelled on her acclaimed On the High Line (now in its third edition from Fordham University Press), Composing Olana unfolds as a series of walks along the seven carriage roads Frederic Edwin Church built here in 1860s-1880s. Along the way, LaFarge unpacks the history of everything we see, and much that we don’t, in the greater landscape, from the Ice Age geology that created it to the artists and conservationists who preserved it. We learn about lesser-known women painters of the Hudson River School; the Native Peoples who lived here before the Europeans arrived; and the mentorship of Church’s only teacher, Thomas Cole.

Archival letters, diaries, and historic accounts reveal Church’s vital role in preserving Niagara Falls; his contributions to Central Park and the Metropolitan Museum of Art; and his engagement with music, photography, and global exploration throughout the second half of the 19th century.

Published to coincide with the 200th anniversary of his birth, Composing Olana enables readers to finally comprehend Church’s vital, and still not properly recognized, place in the American story. Illustrated with dozens of historic and contemporary photographs, it is both a guidebook and a meditation on American art, landscape, and preservation.

An innovative companion website, OlanaBook.com, provides hundreds of photos, audio clips from the soundscape, and an interactive version of the specially created “Rambler’s Map.” Designed as an accessible and lively companion for armchair readers and park visitors, Composing Olana shows why this landscape, still intact today, matters so profoundly in the history of American art and public parks.

Annik LaFarge is a writer, editor, photographer, and lecturer who has been writing about American parks and landscapes since 2008. Author of On the High Line (FUP, 2024), and Chasing Chopin, a New York Times Book Review “Editors’ Choice,” her work has appeared numerous publications including the New York Times, Publishers Weekly, Huff Post, and the Library of Congress’s National Recording Registry. She is a Trustee of the Waterfront Museum in Brooklyn.