#63 • Theodore Lambert "Mt. McKinley, Alaska 20,300" Etching

Part of December 2025 Premier Auction (live auction by Alaska Premier Auctions & Appraisals)

High bid $5,100.00

Status: Sold

Category: Art: Alaskan Multiples

A lifetime Theodore "Ted" Roosevelt Lambert (1905–1960) etching entitled “Mt. McKinley, Alaska, 20,300’.” The work remains in excellent condition, hand-signed, titled, and dated 1946 in the lower margin. Framed under glass, the piece measures 13.75 x 12.5 inches overall. Ted Lambert is widely regarded as one of Alaska’s most significant early 20th-century artists and a leading figure of the “Alaska Modernists,” a group that also included artists such as Jules Dahlager, Eustace Ziegler, and Sydney Laurence. Born in the Idaho Panhandle and raised partly in mining camps, Lambert arrived in Alaska in the 1920s and worked a variety of frontier jobs—cowboy, miner, musher, and railroad laborer—before turning fully to art. His firsthand experience with the territory’s rugged landscapes and remote communities became central to his work, giving his prints and paintings an authenticity rooted in lived experience rather than romanticized imagination. Lambert studied briefly at the Chicago Art Institute, where he developed a strong foundation in draftsmanship and printmaking, later applying these skills to depict Alaska’s mountains, wildlife, and Native communities with a modernist aesthetic. His depictions of Denali, in particular, are among his most admired works, merging precision of line with a dramatic sense of scale. Lambert’s life ended mysteriously in 1960 when he vanished in the wilderness near Chisana; neither he nor his pack were ever found. His legacy, however, remains foundational in the development of 20th-century Alaskan art.