The 19th c. Lifestyles and Leisure Gallery
At the pinnacle of the Hudson River School
Mountain Lake,
Frederic Church
1875
Landscape with
Waterfall,
Frederic Church
1858
Rocky Mountain
Scene with Bear,
Albert Bierstadt
1860
Garden of the
Gods,
Albert Bierstadt
movement, Frederic Church was probably
America’s best known landscape painter. He
studied painting with Thomas Cole himself
for a few years, in which Church learned
his use of the loaded brush and dark colors
to paint highly charged landscape scenes.
Church’s great fame came from the full length
showpiece landscapes, especially his painting
Niagara. Almost all subsequent writing concerned with the history of American painting
has named Niagara as the picture that beyond
all doubt established the importance of what
became known as the Hudson River School.
As it toured and was hailed in Europe as a
tremendous success, Church’s fame, reputation, and canvas size grew.
The Bierstadt Gallery
The steadily increasing belief that Americans were divinely ordained to be the masters of the
continent from sea to shining sea created enormous demand for these painting of a West most art
patrons had yet to see for themselves. Emigrants
Emigrants Resting Resting at Sunset is not a painting about how day
dies and takes a piece of our lives with it; this is a
at Sunset,
Albert Bierstadt painting about the golden future awaiting us on the
horizon. The ‘rest’ in this painting is not the rest
1880
of eternity waiting to enfold us; it is the rest that
refreshes in order to charge a new day. It is Manifest
Destiny made manifest in paint.
Bierstadt also saw the destruction of his beloved
The Bierstadt Gallery
Two artists in particular dominated the later
period of the Hudson River School: Frederic
Church and Albert Bierstadt. While their styles
had certain similarities and their work was
equally popular, they represented different
aspects of the American persona. Church had
come from a wealthy family and represented
an emerging American aristocracy. Bierstadt,
on the other hand, exemplified the American
ideal: the immigrant who came to American
and became a self-made success. Though
born in Prussia in 1830, Bierstadt arrived in
American at the age of 2. Though self-taught
and having only a rudimentary knowledge
of painting, he began offering art lessons
in 1851. Soon he managed to make enough
money to study in Düsseldorf for 3 years.
Bierstadt returned to America and embarked
on a trip to the Rocky Mountains. He set up a
shop in New York City and began producing
his great landscapes of the American West.
These paintings contained large-scale scenery
with dramatic effects of light in what would
seem to us today an almost cinematic view.
Bierstadt and Frederic Church often exhibited
together, even organizing traveling shows of
their “Great Pictures.” The interest in these
large landscapes was fueled by the notion of
Manifest Destiny, a powerful concept even in
the middle of the Civil War.
The
Hudson River School
Self-Guided Tour
Yosemite Valley,
Albert Bierstadt
1890
landscape occurring. When he presented to America
his images of Yosemite Valley, people insisted that
the area be protected. Instead of allowing the valley to be subdivided by settlers, Congress in 1864
gave Yosemite to the state of California, to be held
"indivisible" for all time. A few years later, Thomas
Moran's paintings revealed that Yellowstone was
even more spectacular than Yosemite, and the National Park System was established.
Unfortunately, at exactly the same time Bier-
stadt's reputation was at its height, critical thought
was beginning to turn against him. Critics began
to find his paintings distasteful. The camera was
revealing “real” landscapes, accusing Hudson River
School painters of inaccuracy and hyperbole. A
few artists managed to escape Bierstadt's critical
end by adapting to new art forms influenced by
French painters. The artist who most radically
evolved from Hudson River School origins was
Going Out of the George Inness.
Woods,
George Inness
1866
Sunset,
George Inness
1875
Around the Bierstadt Gallery
Going out of the Woods is indicative of the
Hudson River School and reflective of Inness' early
training. He studied in Europe on two separate occasions, the latter trip resulting in his discovery of the
French group of painters known as the Barbizons.
The Barbizons placed the artist’s vision, rather
then the subject depicted, at the heart of the artistic
process. As Inness developed his style, it became
freer, more atmospheric, and remarkable for the
nearly palpable atmosphere of light and air that he
created, as can be seen in Sunset.
Today, these artists’ reputations have been restored and their work is represented in major museums the world over. Their work is a priceless legacy,
a heritage in which we see not only the America that
was but also the hope of what it can be.
Yellowstone Falls
Albert Bierstadt
The R.W. Norton Art Gallery
4747 Creswell Ave
Shreveport, Louisiana 71106
318-865-4201
www.rwnaf.org
The American Art History Gallery: "Snow Squall" by Thomas Cole
The Lobby: "Haying" and "Landscape, Sunset" by Asher Durand
would be an English immigrant to America who freed American
In the early years of the Republic, America was still struggling with Iartt from
European confines—Thomas Cole. Cole was of humble
self-definition, still feeling entrapped by older European models of
culture, feeling most keenly of all, its own lack of history. Most were
inclined to accept at face value the assertion that art had to possess
historical authentication – that is to say, some connection to symbolism,
myth, or religious narrative. The less difference you could tell between
an American work and a European work, the better the American
piece was considered to be, as can be seen in Haying. However, as
Romanticism became the prevailing philosophic movement of the
early 19th century, veneration for nature became an inspiration for
American painters. Regarding the landscape as a direct manifestation
of God, a loose band of painters began to record the most perfect and
sublime examples of the presence of the divine in the natural world. In
Landscape, Sunset, Durand embraces the wilderness and eliminates all
signs of man’s intrusion. Unlike European painters, the Hudson River
painters sought to approach nature with reverence and portrayed it with
the detailed care of a naturalist.
The 19th Century Lifestyles and Leisure Gallery
"Mountain Lake Near Piedmont, WV" by William Sonnatg
background, largely self-educated, comfortable with solitude, a natural
philosopher who loved the wilderness, and was confidant of his own
intellect and abilities. He is considered the Father of the Hudson River
School, America’s first homegrown, coherent, and sizeable group of
landscape artists that began in the 1820s. Cole took this idea of the
wilderness as the face of God and created an artistic movement around
it. He established the rules of painting that would govern the Hudson
River School and American landscape painting. First, painters were to
go out and observe the actual world of nature firsthand. Second, artists
were to strive for the ideal. This was to be a benevolent wilderness born
of benign faith. The third and final rule was that each work should be the
expression of lofty ideas: Faith, hope, power, and blissful transcendance
were all depicted in paint by these talented artists.
Like other Hudson River school painters, Cropsey believed in going
out and actually observing nature, but he didn’t produce his paintings
by sitting out on a hillside with an easel and canvas. Instead, he made
sketches of the best aspects of nature that he could find. Then he returned to the studio and, painting in oils, created an idealized composite
landscape. So a tree and a boulder from one location might end up in a
painting with a mountain crag and river from an entirely different place.
These artists were not interested in painting anything as limited as reality; they were attempting to render God’s presence in the natural world,
a different and higher reality. Jasper Cropsey was best known for his
vivid use of color with chromium colors made commercially available
in the 1850's in premade tubes. These colors were unavailable to Cole,
which is why his work appears muted compared to later artists.
nnnnnnnnnnn
The 19th Century Lifestyles and Leisure Gallery
"Yosemite Valley" by Thomas Hill
n the 1840s, America embraced the concept of Manifest Destiny,
Time marches on and the frontier began to creep ever westward. Imoving
ever Westward. Hudson River School artists often accompanied
Sonntag was one of the rare members of the Hudson River School who
was actually a “Westerner.” Born in Pittsburg, he and his family soon
moved to Cincinnati, where his father encouraged him to study carpentry. After Sonntag's three day stint as a carpenter’s assistant, his father
relented and allowed his son to pursue his dream of becoming an artist.
Largely self taught, Sonntag shared with the first generation of Hudson
River School painters a deep regard for the natural, untouched beauty
of America’s mountain scenery. An article in the press commented on
his works: “This country of ours possess sublime composition direct
from the Creator’s hand; and when our painters learn to catch the spirit
and majesty of these divine works, then shall we see works as noble as
any of the generations have ever known.” Sonntag, eager to fulfill the
prophecy, painted his idealized concepts of America’s rugged natural
beauty in the characteristic Hudson River style: using a broad, horizontal
format for grand views of wooded, mountainous scenery and applying
thin, uniform pigment with careful attention to detail.
The American Art History Gallery: "Niagara Falls" by Jasper Cropsey
government surveyors on their expeditions west, taking detailed notes on
landscapes no white man had ever seen before. Upon entering Yosemite
Valley, as depicted here by Thomas Hill, these teams saw bubbling
mud pits, vertical cliffs, towering mountain crags, and spewing gysers.
Despite these hellish sites, the artists painted the grandeur and glory of
the landscape. Landscapes like these enticed folks back east to explore
the natural grandeur of the west. Some simply could not believe such
sights existed. The tourist trade blossomed, and the advancing technology of the railroad made travel easier and more affordable.
"The Ruins of Jamestown" by Daniel Huntington
With the increase in foot traffic, the wilderness began to be exploited.
Overabundant and seemingly endless natural resources were plundered
for burgeoning industries. Tourists erected cabins, then towns, then
cities, that ate away at the natural landscape. It seemed the Hudson
River School had made America fall in love with the landscape just in
time to see it destroyed.
The 19th Century Lifestyles and Leisure Gallery
"View of Philadelphia..." by Thomas Moran
It was the Hudson River School artists who saw the glory and magnifi-
cence of the American landscape and it was Hudson River School artists
who noticed it was disappearing. A few artists went so far as to express
doubts concerning the ability of Americans to find a balance between
nature and progress, as Huntington boldly stated with his symbolism.
But once the danger was revealed by the poet’s paintbrush, it would
also be the Hudson River School artists with the help of Congress
who would preserve the New Eden for future generations. Ultimately,
Thomas Moran manages to make this an optimistic painting—using
the rainbow over the city as a symbol of fortune: Manifest Destiny at
its most determined; where Americans go, goodness follows.
The Olla Podidra Gallery
"Deep in a Wood" by Thomas Moran
This painting is painted in grisaille, meaning painted with black and
white, for ease of reproduction with chromolithography. Moran’s work
was increasingly in demand for calendars, ink blotters, travel brochures,
and other ephemera, and by the early 1890s his paintings were being
reproduced on a large scale.