Our Banner in the Sky
Frederic Edwin Church, 1861
1861. After Fort Sumter. Sunset as a torn flag — stars through blue, red stripes of cloud. A dead tree for a pole. The country is the sky.
About this work
Frederic Edwin Church painted Our Banner in the Sky in 1861, at the start of the American Civil War, after the Confederate attack on Fort Sumter. He was inspired by a sunset in red, white and blue, which he took as a sign that "the heavens indicated their support for the United States by reflecting the nation's colors in the setting sun". In the small oil sketch, streaks of red cloud form the stripes of a flag and a patch of blue sky scattered with stars forms its canton, while the bare trunk of a dead tree stands in for the flagpole above a darkening landscape. A lithograph was made from the painting and sold to benefit the families of Union soldiers. Church, born in Hartford, Connecticut, in 1826, had trained under Thomas Cole and was by then the leading landscape painter of his day, famous for huge, minutely detailed canvases such as Niagara and The Heart of the Andes, which he showed in single-painting exhibitions that thousands paid to see. Our Banner in the Sky is the opposite: a small, quick oil on paper, made in the first months of the war.
Sources: Wikimedia Commons · Wikipedia: Frederic Edwin Church
Print facts
- Native resolution
- 4,044 × 2,640 px
- Sharp at 150 ppi up to
- 26 × 17 in
- Sizes
- Small (20 × 13 in) · $100 · 202 ppi
Medium (24 × 16 in) · $150 · 165 ppi
Large (36 × 24 in) · $300 · 110 ppi - Price includes
- Frame and US shipping · 14–21 days · 30-day returns
FAQ
Where can I buy a framed print of Our Banner in the Sky?
Here. Our Banner in the Sky is available as a framed print in three sizes: Small (20 × 13 in) for $100, Medium (24 × 16 in) for $150 and Large (36 × 24 in) for $300. Prices include the frame and US shipping; delivery takes 14–21 days, with 30-day returns.
What size works best for Our Banner in the Sky?
The file is 4,044 × 2,640 px. Medium (24 × 16 in) is the largest size that prints at 150 ppi or more (165 ppi), the sharpest choice for close viewing; Large (36 × 24 in) prints at 110 ppi, fine from a few feet away but softer up close.
Is it legal to print Our Banner in the Sky?
Yes. Our Banner in the Sky is in the public domain: its copyright, if it ever had one, expired long ago. In the United States a faithful photograph of a public-domain painting does not create a new copyright (Bridgeman v. Corel, 1999), so the image can be printed and sold freely.
