View of Poestenkill, New York

Joseph H. Hidley

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Hidley worked in Poestenkill, New York, as a house painter, a handyman, an artist, and served as sexton of the Evangelical Lutheran Church. He painted a series of townscapes of Poestenkill and the surrounding villages, applying an aerial view and incorporating clearly defined, recognizable buildings in his compositions. Here, the aforementioned church, next to which Hidley lived, is the most prominent structure. Poesten Kill—“kill,” from the Dutch, means “creek”—can be seen both in the left foreground, where it passes under a bridge, and in the far distance, where it spills over a dam. The town was an important lumbering center, and many mills were located along the creek.

The American Wing

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The American Wing's ever-evolving collection comprises some 20,000 works of art by African American, Euro American, Latin American, and Native American men and women. Ranging from the colonial to early-modern periods, the holdings include painting, sculpture, works on paper, and decorative arts—including furniture, textiles, ceramics, glass, silver, metalwork, jewelry, basketry, quill and bead embroidery—as well as historical interiors and architectural fragments.

Metropolitan Museum of Art