1
|
- American Art 1820-1870
- Donna M. Campbell, Washington State University
- Note: Unfortunately, this slide show does not work well in Firefox. Use
Internet Explorer if you want to see all the pictures and notes.
|
2
|
- Portraiture
- European influence
- American “Naive” style
- Flat design, spare painting (Ammi Phillips, 1788-1865)
- Landscapes
- Often appear as detail of portraiture: property seen through an open
window indicates wealth
- Washington Allston’s imaginary landscapes
|
3
|
- John Singleton Copley, Paul Revere, 1768
|
4
|
- Ammi Phillips, Portrait of Harriet Campbell, 1815
|
5
|
- Edward Hicks, The Peaceable Kingdom (1834)
|
6
|
- Not merely topographic but interpretive and poetic views of nature
- Formal composition and attention to detail
- Depictions of harmony in nature
|
7
|
- “Home in the Wilderness”
- Juncture of civilization and wilderness: “Wilderness on the doorstep”
- Incursions of civilization and progress
|
8
|
|
9
|
|
10
|
|
11
|
|
12
|
- Juxtaposition of elements
- Use of panoramic views and small human figures to show immensity of
nature and insignificance of human beings
- Distant or elevated perspective for the viewer
- Symbolic use of light and darkness
- Contrast of diverse elements to show the unity of nature
|
13
|
|
14
|
|
15
|
|
16
|
- Longinus, On the Sublime (AD 50)
- Resulting from spirit--a spark from writer to reader--rather than
technique
- Edmund Burke, Philosophical Inquiry into the Origins of Our Ideas of the
Sublime and Beautiful (1757-1759)
- Immanuel Kant, Critique of Judgment (1790)
- Beauty is finite; the sublime is infinite
|
17
|
- Feminine qualities
- Harmony
- Sociability
- Pastels
- Sensual curves
|
18
|
- Painful idea creates a sublime passion
- Sublime concentrates the mind on a single facet of experience, producing
a momentary suspension of rational activity
- Harsh, antisocial, “masculine” representations exist in the realm of
obscurity and brute force
|
19
|
- “Agreeable horror” results from portrayals of threatening objects
- Greater aesthetic value if the pain producing the effect is imaginary
rather than real
- Feelings of awe at sublime nature the aim of certain kinds of art
- Influenced Poe, the “Graveyard School” of poetry, and Gothic novels
|
20
|
|
21
|
|
22
|
- Intermediate category between the sublime and the beautiful
- Allowed the painter to organize nature into what Pope called a “wild
civility”
- William Gilpin: illustrated tours in the 1790s established the
conventions
|
23
|
- Ruggedness and asymmetry
- Irregularity of line
- Contrasts of light and shadow
- Landscape as a rundown Arcadia
- Ruined towers, fractured rocks
- Mossy banks and winding streams
- Blighted or twisted trees
- Appeal to nostalgia for preindustrial age
|
24
|
|
25
|
- Thomas Cole (1801-1848)
- Asher B. Durand (1796-1886)
- Thomas Doughty (1793-1856)
- John William Casilear
|
26
|
- Discovered in 1825 by
- John Trumbull,
- William Dunlap
- Asher B. Durand
- “The subject of art should
- be pure and lofty . . .a moral,
- religious, or poetic effect
- must be produced on the mind.”
|
27
|
- Lake with
Dead Trees
(1825)
- The painting that made Cole famous.
|
28
|
|
29
|
|
30
|
|
31
|
- Began as an engraver; turned to painting
- “Letters on Landscape Painting” (1855) in The Crayon
- “Go first to nature to learn to paint landscape.”
|
32
|
|
33
|
- Thomas Cole and William Cullen Bryant
- See Bryant’s “To Cole, the Painter, Departing for Europe.”
|
34
|
|
35
|
- Second Generation of Hudson River school
- Style of Hudson River painters applied to other regions:
- Rocky Mountains
- South America
|
36
|
- Jasper Cropsey (1823-1900)
- Frederic E. Church (1826-1900)
- John Frederick Kensett (1816-1873)
- George Inness (1825-1894)
- Albert Bierstadt (1830-1902)
|
37
|
- Imitator of Cole’s allegorical works
- Panorama of Pilgrim’s Progress:
- Sixty large scenes unrolled to music and lectures.
- Panorama was eight feet high by 850’ long.
- Entire presentation took about two hours.
|
38
|
|
39
|
|
40
|
|
41
|
- Thomas Cole’s major pupil
- Full-length “showpiece” landscapes
- Falls of Niagara (1857)
- Heart of the Andes (1859)
- Landscape as symbol of divine
- American continent as new Eden
- Painted from nature, not notes and sketches
|
42
|
- Compare this painting with a photograph taken near the same spot in
2000.
|
43
|
|
44
|
|
45
|
- The Lackawanna Valley (1855)
- Landscape meditation on relation of man and nature
- Harmonious integration of man’s progress and landscape
- Unlike Cole: “A work of art does not appeal to the moral sense. Its aim is not to instruct and edify,
but to awaken an emotion.”
|
46
|
|
47
|
|
48
|
- One of first major artists to explore the West
- The Rocky Mountains, Lander’s Peak (1863)
- A Storm in the Rocky Mountains (1866)
- Yosemite Valley (1875)
|
49
|
|
50
|
|
51
|
|
52
|
- Not of the Hudson River school
- Created dreamlike, fanciful interpretations of literary scenes
- Artisan-painter: uses bright, ornamental colors
|
53
|
|
54
|
|
55
|
- Among the sources used:
- E. P. Richardson, Painting in America
- Ellwood C. Parry, Art of Thomas Cole
- John K. Howatt, The Hudson River and Its Painters
- General knowledge about Hudson River school
- Burke, Kant, Longinus
- Pictures are mostly from Sandra Hildreth’s site (used with permission)
|
56
|
- The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
- Brief discussion of the school from “I hear America Singing” at pbs.org
- Index of Hudson River paintings (many images)
- The Artfact site has a brief description of the school and links to many
of the lesser-known painters.
- More paintings and links from artlex.com
- The Albany Institute has images of paintings by Cole, Durand, and
others.
- Hudson River School entry from Wikipedia.
- A project by Kathleen Hogan (American Studies) at the University of
Virginia discusses Alexis de Tocqueville and the Hudson River School.
- The New-York Historical Society site features an essay on the school and
a description of the museum’s current exhibition on New York paintings,
which runs through February 2006.
|