C. C. A. Christensen

About the Book

This book contributes to the growing interest in C. C. A. Christensen’s legacy and his influence on Mormon thought and religious art. It offers a thorough and sustained examination of his written and visual work in conversation with each other. This study provides a detailed art historical analysis of Christensen’s paintings, including how he used style, symbolism, and composition in sophisticated ways to create meaning in his art that echoed and affected Mormon thought. This analysis re-evaluates Christensen’s role in the development of American art and Latter-day Saint art, and in the formation of Mormon memory and self-identity. Drawing on Christensen’s biography as a Danish immigrant and American pioneer, this study reveals his complex relationship with the symbol of wilderness and how the American frontier represented ideas about political and religious liberty; his ability to blend European, American, and distinctly Latter-day Saint ideologies and iconographies; and his passionate dedication to both his Scandinavian heritage and the Zion community he envisioned in America. Finally, the bibliographic essay details Christensen’s artistic oeuvre and writings and considers their reception. This book argues that Christensen’s artistic and written work reflected and even shaped the culture and beliefs of nineteenth-century Latter-day Saints in ways that remain today.