No longer missing in action: Atlanta Cyclorama painting restoration brings back trimmed sky, two vertical sections in battlefield

Decatur Road swath was gone for 97 years (AHC photos)

This is what the result of the lopping looked like at Grant Park

And the section returned this year (AHC)

Over the past year and a half, a team restoring the "Battle of Atlanta" cyclorama painting has worked to make it whole again -- literally.

They have added 7 feet of sky and painted two sections of the circular mural that were removed over the years, for different reasons.

“The main driving force for us in conserving this painting has been to return to it to what the artists originally intended in 1886,” said Gordon L. Jones, senior military historian and curator at the Atlanta History Center, the cyclorama’s new home.

When the attraction opens in February 2019, AHC officials say patrons will see a painting that will transport them back to when it was completed by German, Swiss and other artists in Milwaukee. 

Gone will be a number of clouds painted in over the years to cover water damage and incorrect shades of paint dabbed on the Belgian linen during previous restorations.

Visitors also will see much more sky than when the giant painting was at Grant Park. Before it was put in that building, portions were lopped off during the attraction’s traveling days. 

(Those who saw the painting at Grant Park will remember sitting on a revolving platform. That’s gone. Instead, visitors will stand on a circular stage and turn to take it all in, as the artists intended, Jones said.)

The Atlanta Cyclorama depicts a crucial moment during the July 22, 1864, Battle of Atlanta. Union Maj. Gen. John "Black Jack" Logan is rallying his troops to successfully thwart a Confederate breakthrough at the Troup Hurt House east of downtown.

Trees to the left of the Troup Hurt House have made a return

(Photos courtesy of AHC)

Artists earlier this year painted in a 6-foot wide section showing Decatur Road. That vertical strip had been trimmed so that the painting could squeeze into its Grant Park home in 1921.

The other restored section was near the hip-roofed Troup Hurt House (left). That 54-inch-wide strip was excised between 1892 (when the painting was in a building on Edgewood Avenue) and 1901.

Jones said there were two reported instances of major damage during the time – from a roof collapse during an 1893 snowstorm and a roof collapse, rot and structural failure in 1898, when the mural was in an early building at Grant Park.

“My guess would be that the excision was in 1893, because shortly thereafter they rolled up the painting to move to Grant Park and probably just lopped off the damaged section before they rehung it,” he said. 

Photo placed on viewing platform (Civil War Picket photo)

Photographs (above) taken shortly after the painting was finished have been invaluable to the restoration effort.

Jones told the Picket a few years ago that the history center had 1:10 scale preliminary drawings that were given to the original artists in Milwaukee.

“To reproduce the preliminary drawing, sets of 10 photos were made of the entire length and distributed to the artists working on the painting,” Jones said in 2014. “We now have seven of the 10 – a great aid to restoration – but we do not have the section covering the Decatur Road – only the photo of the finished painting.”

With the added sections, the art work is now 371 feet in circumference and 49 feet high.

1886 artists worked from these sketches (AHC)

I recently took part in a 90-minute, behind-the-scenes tour of the painting restoration and the locomotive Texas, made famous in the 1862 Great Locomotive Chase between Atlanta and Chattanooga, Tenn. It had been three years since I last saw the monumental painting depicting moments of triumph, loss, chaos and resolve on a hot summer day in 1864.

City officials in 2014 announced the painting would be relocated to the history center. In early 2017, the mural was rolled onto two huge scrolls and trucked from Grant Park to the history center.

Part 2: A deeper look at the painting's restoration and what's planned for exhibits and interpretation. Click here