For many years,  Sunset on July 26, 1870, was misattributed to Jervis McEntee, a former pupil of Church’s. However, Gerald L. Carr, a leading Church scholar and author of his catalog raisonné, compellingly argues for Church as the true painter of the picture. Notably, he corroborates the handwriting of the signature with that of other Church paintings. Likewise, Carr has noted that during June and July 1870, when building on Church’s now-historic home Olana had begun, Church executed a group of small paintings of morning and evening skies surrounding the house, all of which are dated like the present work. Many of these are now in the collection of the Cooper Hewitt Smithsonian Design Museum, New York, in addition to one owned by the Olana State Historic Site. With its effortless flair and sumptuous, painterly dabs of color, the piece initially seems at odds with the technical fastidiousness of Church’s better-known landscapes. However, this predilection for a looser style is not uncommon in Church’s smaller studio paintings. As such,  Sunset on July 26, 1870, was almost certainly meant as a private nature study, not as a commission or painted for a specific exhibition. 

Mountainside Downpour  shares a similarly intriguing history, in this case, regarding its provenance. The scene depicts the southern tip of the Catskill Mountains as dark rainclouds lingers overhead, unleashing a torrent of water onto the mountain as illustrated by Church’s vigorous, fluid downward brushstrokes. It was previously in the collection of Walter Launt Palmer, the son of nineteenth-century sculptor Erastus Dow Palmer. Erastus was a pupil of Church’s, studying with him at Olana in the early 1870s when he was only just a teenager. The two worked quite well together, going on to share a studio in New York City by 1878. The painting then remained with Palmer’s estate until 2017. That it remained in the family for so long is a testament to the impact Church had on the young Palmer.