de Boer, Wareham Publish Book on New Haven’s West and East Rock; Book Signing Sept. 22

Jelle Zelinga de Boer, the Harold T. Stearns Professor of Earth Science, emeritus, is the author of New Haven’s Sentinels: The Art and Science of East Rock and West Rock, published by The Driftless Connecticut Series and Garnet Books in July 2013.

John Wareham, video production coordinator for Information Technology Services, provided photographs for the book.

East Rock and West Rock are volcanic entities that were emplaced in voluminous sandstone formations some 201 million years ago. Their presence facilitated the introduction of modern (European) geologic concepts in America by Yale University Professor Benjamin Silliman and his disciples. Furthermore, more than a dozen artists, among them such illustrious painters as Frederick Church, George Durrie, Robert Havell, William Wall and John Weir, sought to capture the magic of these rock formations. Their works are classic American, uninfluenced by imported European styles and heralded the advent of plein air landscape painting in America after more than a century in which portraitures dominated its art world. Several of the artists that worked in New Haven became nationally known, but others have somehow not been given the recognition they deserve.

To celebrate his new book, New Haven’s Sentinels, de Boer will offer a talk and book signing at 2 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 22 at the New Haven Museum, located at 114 Whitney Avenue in New Haven, Conn.

Admission to the lecture is free; donations are welcomed. Copies of the book will be available for sale.

Read more about this book in this Hartford Courant article.