Our mission is to tell the stories that trace the ways in which American identity was formed and continues to be shaped.

We want to find and explore the elusive springs of national identity for America’s cultures; to rejuvenate a public interest in our shared history; and to prompt fresh concern for the preservation and celebration of our various identities, starting with the indigenous peoples of this continent and their homelands.

To tell these stories in words and images, we may focus through the prism of landscape, psychology, history, or literature. Whether the theme of identity formation is discovered in the past or the present, or in still other areas of inquiry, our passion is to combine prose and photography into compelling narratives.

We want to tell future generations who we are and what we cared so fervently about, that we saved these stories for them in legacy works of print and film.

Our sponsors include local and national thought-leaders and decision makers, people who share our recognition of how important cultural identity and preservation have become.

Albemarle Books is the entity for publishing the first book in this series, Albemarle: a Story of Landscape and American Identity. The Rivanna Foundation is a non-profit 501(c)3, which grew out of Albemarle Books to publish Empires in the Forest: Jamestown and the Beginning of America—as well as future books, and films.

Our sponsors are:

Robert H. Smith; Dominion; ExxonMobil; The Virginia Foundation for the Humanities; the Virginia National Bank; Embarq; the W.L.Lyons Brown, Jr. Charitable Foundation; Keswick Hall at Monticello; McLean Faulconer, Inc., Realtors; A. Cary Brown; C. Wilson and Carter McNeely III; Dorothy Batten; Katherine Brooks; Margareta Douglas; Robert Strini; Jerome and Paula Beazley; Judy and Mark Giles; Sheila and Ted Weschler; The Hook; Meridian Air Group, Inc.; First Avenue Networks, Inc.; Peninsula Capital Advisors, LLC; and others.

We believe that we are making books and films that will have an enduring life and impact. Ambitious though this may be, we believe that our inherited identity, and its preservation in this medium of artistic pictures and prose, is an accomplishment that we can only reasonably achieve together.

AVERY CHENOWETH is a Charlottesville writer who also enjoys a national reputation for his novel-in-stories, Wingtips, which was nominated for the Sue Kaufman prize from the American Academy, and short-listed for the Library of Virginia Fiction Prize. He has received fellowships from Yaddo, the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, and the Sewanee Writers Conference.

ROBERT LLEWELLYN is a nationally renowned photographer whose more than 30 books have all been best-sellers. Among his titles, Academical Village, American Gargoyles: Spirits in Stone and Upland Virginia have long been favorites, including UVA Alumni, residents and companies, with numerous reprintings and an evergreen appeal as gifts that capture a unique vision of the area and the university grounds. Washington, The Capitol, one of his titles, became an official diplomatic gift of the White House and the State Department. He and his family live in the country near Charlottesville, Virginia.