Jervis McEntee (American, 1828-91), "Natural Bridge, 1877" (Image courtesy Virginia Museum of Fine Arts)
The Virginia Museum of Fine Arts has got a bridge for you — Rockbridge County’s Natural Bridge. You can see it for free in “Virginia Arcadia: The Natural Bridge in American Art,” which opens Feb. 6.
Thomas Jefferson purchased the land in 1774, and the site became one of the state’s earliest tourist attractions. Indigenous peoples likely knew the 400-million-year-old limestone formation as a sacred place. The remnant of the collapsed roof of an underground river, the site became one of the 19th century’s most depicted examples of natural wonder. Artists’ works in the exhibition include pieces by Joshua Shaw, Jacob Caleb Ward, David Johnson and Edward Hicks.
