American Landscape Painting Analysis

The History of American Landscape Painting 1

The History of American Landscape Painting

Hayleigh Weldin

California State University, Bakersfield

Landscape paintings became of interest to artists as a way to depict nature, a man?s spiritual place in the world, and his relation to God (Pohl, 2012). The paintings of nature became a way for artists to express themselves visually and spiritually while also expanding what people could see, read, and feel (Pohl, 2012). Landscape paintings helped to grow communities and expand the western movement (Pohl, 2012). There was an issue between tearing down and using the resources of nature to build communities and to increase material wealth (Pohl, 2012).

Angela Miller examined landscape

painting and its impact on the expansion of America in her book, The Empire of the Eye: Landscape Representation in American Cultural Politics 1825-1875. The book discusses the life and success of Thomas Cole as a landscape painter and how his artwork brought a new excitement and a feeling for the meaning of his work. Angela Miller's book discussed national landscape painting, the artists who played a major role in its creation, the goals and ambitions of the artists involved, and the choices they made in their painting of the national landscape. Angela's Miller book, The Empire of the Eye: Landscape Representation in American Cultural Politics, 1825-1875 (1993), goes into detail about how, "artists, critics, collectors, and men of letters collaborated in devising an institutionalized aesthetic and in implementing a certain critical and stylistic orthodoxy that subsequently appeared as a fully natural development of an emergent nationalism" (pg. 3).
According to Joseph Skrapits (1994), Thomas Cole wrote in 1825, "the most lovely and perfect parts of nature which may be brought together and combined in a whole, that shall surpass in beauty and effect any picture painted from a single view" (p. 20). The collecting and sketching of plants in nature from an artistic and scientific view was an important part of the first American explorations (Novak, 1980). Cole was prominent in beginning the movement of "American Sublime" (Lewis, 2002). Cole, the son of a textile manufacturer, was born in Lancashire, England in 1801 (Lewis, 2002). His family immigrated to the United States when he was sixteen years old (Lewis, 2002). He received his education in painting at the Academy of Fine Arts in Philadelphia (Lewis, 2002). Thomas Cole (1801-1848), was one of the most talented and first recognized of American landscape painters of his time (Skrapits, 1994). He traveled on many expeditions across the American continent doing sketches of the American wilderness (Lewis, 2002). Thomas Cole sensed a feeling of tragedy as civilization developed across the continent changing and clearing the beauty of nature, from the landscape (Lewis, 2002). On these expeditions, he made pencil drawings, which he later transformed, into finish paintings (Lewis, 2002). Out of these reflections of what he viewed in nature, emerged his works "The Course of the Empire 1834-1836" and the "Voyage of Life 1840-42" (Lewis, 2002). The Course of the Empire 1834-1836 told a story of a nation developing slowly from cruelty and violence to a society based on corruption to fall (Lewis, 2002). Many artists followed his methods of developing paintings from sketches in future generations from the Hudson River School (Skrapits, 1994). Albert Bierstadt (1830-1902), was a German-born immigrant who came to the United States as a young child (Lewis, 2002). Bierstadt returned to Germany to study art and applied glossy finishes to his artwork, which depicted a look of humidity (Lewis, 2002). He returned to the United States and joined an expedition to the Rocky Mountains (Lewis, 2002). He drew many sketches while on his trip using the techniques from the Hudson River School (Lewis, 2002). He used his techniques to paint the "Rocky Mountains, Landers Peak (1863)": the painting was vertical and seven feet tall (Lewis, 2002). His next painting was, "Storm in the Rocky Mountains- Mt. Rosalie 1866": this painting surpassed in size to the first one "Landers Peak," nearly reaching twelve feet wide (Lewis, 2002). The artworks from the Hudson River School were considered one of the favorable and creative movements admired for its natural wilderness of the continent while implying a message and values (Lewis, 2002). According to Lewis (2002), Cole expressed in his landscape paintings different conditions in civilization on the same charting of details, "a harbor beside a steep mountain, progressing from spring to winter, and from dawn to twilight" (p.30). Cole also explored the use of "atmospherics," using different techniques showing the effects of light, air, and clouds (Lewis, 2002). The traditional colors used by Thomas Cole were similar to that used by Rembrand: they consisted of earth tone pigments (Lewis, 2002).
In Barbara Novak's book, Nature and Culture (1980), Cole detailed the color of the forest, the ocean, the clouds upon the evening sky, and the glorious light in a poem of Autumn (Novak, 1980). This reflected the attitudes and views of the time (Novak, 1980). According to Novak (1980), Cole stated, "Beauty doth fade?its emblem is a leaf/ That mingles with the earth and quick decay" (p.109). The painting, The Voyage of Life, shows an Angel and a small child on the boat surrounded by plants, flowers, and water (Novak, 1980).
Thomas Cole's life and his part in American landscape painting helped him to become recognized as a founding father of a National School of Landscape Art (Miller, 1993). There were significant differences between Cole and other artists who followed in his footsteps (Miller, 1993). Cole rejected the statements of nationalism and of an art that was based off the ideas of American exceptionalism (Miller, 1993). Cole had a very strong attachment to the older eighteenth-century republican frame of mind; he believed that universal truths and historical laws consisted even during the time that this idea was set apart from others (Miller, 1993). Cole was mindful that America's political and social well-being was dependent on foreign visitors (Miller, 1993). In Angela Miller's book, The Empire of the Eye: Landscape Representations and American Cultural Politics, 1825-1875 (1993), The New York Literary World said that Cole was, "the best interpreter of the teaching of American nature" (p.22). His ideas would later change the identity of landscape art, making it a cultural aspect of national identity (Miller, 1993).
Following Cole's death, the First New York School was established (Miller, 1993). This school was formatted around the ideas and myths that Cole had spoken of in earlier times (Miller, 1993). Cole wanted to challenge the future artists to achieve the rights of nature by grasping onto its image and meaning (Miller, 1993). Even though Cole was against nationalist pride, his opinions would not stand in the way of how his work and myths would inspire future artists (Miller, 1993). Cole's winning force was that of his power to bring attention to the eye-catching nature viewed through landscape art during a time when this was still being disputed (Miller, 1993). Cole's strong relationship to nature made him the perfect father figure for the New York Landscape School (Miller, 1993).
Mystery surrounded Cole's death in 1848 as to who would follow him as his successor in American landscape painting (Pohl, 2012).

It appeared that Asher B. Durand who was the president of the National Academy of Design would be a reasonable choice to follow in Cole's footsteps; however, this did not happen (Pohl, 2012). Asher B. Durand was a prominent landscape artist on the East Coast who began his career as an engraver in the 1830s before making a change to painting landscapes (Pohl, 2012). In 1849 after the death of Thomas Cole, Asher B. Durand created a painting called, The Kindred Spirits depicting Cole with his friend William Collin Bryant (Lewis, 2002). The backdrop for the painting showed two of Cole's favorite sceneries, Kaaterskill Falls and Catskill Clove (Lewis, 2002). The painting, The Kindred Spirits, was viewed as the beginning work of "American Sublime" (Lewis, 2002). Thomas Cole had a shining artist following in his tracks by the name of Frederic Edwin Church (Miller, 1993). Church became Thomas Cole's student in 1844 and was known to be the only one who studied under his direction (Pohl, 2012). Church in his landscape painting depicted nature transformed by civilization (Pohl, 2012). Church and other artists who had followed Cole had a lot of pressure on themselves to maintain the high praise and dignity that Cole had gained on landscape art while still pursuing a national voice and changing the way people viewed landscape art and what it meant to

them (Miller, 1993). The artists also felt that Cole's national meaning of the story should be celebrated as a triumph, not as a loss (Miller, 1993). Considering the fact that the new oncoming artists thought Cole should be respected for his ideas, many of the new artists disregarded Cole's intellectual dispute regarding nationalism, which was an important aspect of landscape painting during the mid-century (Miller, 1993). The differences between Cole and the young new artists was that they were not quick to judge anyone or anything and they had a tighter bond with the public (Miller, 1993). Artists during the 1850s had an array of colors available to use in their pallet, which gave their landscape paintings a captivating luster compared to an earth tone pallet (Lewis, 2002).
In 1848, following the death of Thomas Cole, Frederic Edwin Church created an honor, "To the Memory of Cole" (Pohl, 2012). Church included mountains in his landscape paintings that were recognized as the Catskills, which were considered as a perfect holy place (Pohl, 2012). Church was considered to be the rightful replacement of Cole (Pohl, 2012). Church painted a collection of paintings that mimicked Cole's historical landscapes such as Hooker and Company Journeying Through the Wilderness from Plymouth to Hartford in 1636 (1846) (Pohl, 2012). Church persisted in emulating Cole's attempts, "to infuse realistic landscape with deep and profound content" (Pohl, 2012). Church was fascinated by the high quality of colors in the tropics, the vivid colors of birds, fish, insects, and flowers (Lewis, 2002). Church was able to bring together science and religion in his landscape paintings in a way that Cole was not successful at doing (Pohl, 2012). Church was able to pick up key information about the problems with national identity and he knew that from being an artist during his time would put him in a tough position to support his feelings on the matter (Miller, 1993). The issues revolving around nationalism would be noticeable in some of Church's work (Miller, 1993). Church's landscape painting of New England Scenery 1851, he painted refined fields, a small town with a church tower, saw mill, and showed the clearing of land and the use of new technology (Pohl, 2012). He used his own home and a region's landscape and tried to incorporate it into the national scenery (Miller, 1993). The painting included a background full of the rocky landscape, hills, trees, and a small village further out (Miller, 1993). He wanted people to see that the smaller area in a scene could be transformed into a much larger picture with more depth meaning (Miller, 1993). Church would later go on to paint this picture with oils, which gave it a much different look (Miller, 1993). The painting looked more breathtaking with darker shades of clouds, the sun beaming off the water, you could see the animals drinking water in the background, and you could again see the tiny village that was full of life (Miller, 1993). Church was compensated in 1851 when the American Art Union chose the piece to be carved for its members to view (Miller, 1993). Church used sawmills in his landscape paintings instead of customary grist mills because they were considered a more assured view of the clearing of the land than tree stumps, which were often, included in the focal point of landscape paintings (Pohl, 2012).
Church's landscape paintings of New England Scenery 1851, was not characteristic of his earlier geographical landscapes and did not document a specific place (Pohl, 2012). He combined several different scenes together to make an extensive statement (Pohl, 2012). His paintings recorded realistic details and controlled images of authenticity (Pohl, 2012). The bridges and roads represented the growth of transportation networks, mills technology, cleared fields-agriculture, and the church-religion (Pohl, 2012). The wagon in the painting represented the movement of the hard-working New Englander's and their political, religious, and economic beliefs as they traveled westward across the continent of America (Pohl, 2012).
According to Pohl (2012), "in the middle of 1850s Church's work began to shift from the pastoral landscape to the dramatic wilderness, from the picturesque to the sublime" (p. 158). Church's painting, "Our Banner in the Sky," showed the American Flag floating out of the sunset in the sky with glimmering stars (Lewis, 2002). It depicted a political message and image during the Civil War (Lewis, 2002). Art was not evaluated by its fundamental class and precision of its design and form, its intent was to create a psychological effect on the person viewing the artwork (Lewis, 2002). "The American Sublime: Landscape Painting in the United States 1820-1880," was a beautiful display that exhibited the foundation of the school ran by Thomas Cole, the expansion of work created by Asher B. Durand and others, and finally its ability to move forward from what artists knew in the beginning to a new generation of landscape painting (Lewis, 2002). In Church's travels to South America in 1853, he produced a series of four masterpiece landscape paintings, The Andes of Ecuador (1855), The Heart of the Andes (1859), Cotopaxi (1862), and Rainy Season in the Tropic (1866) (Lewis 2002). Church looked for color to depict in his paintings everywhere (Lewis, 2002). His most prominent color studies were depicted in a painting called, The Icebergs (1861), it showed the white sculptures of the ice bergs with colors of turquoise and violet that made it look like the mountains were semitransparent reflecting these colors from within (Lewis, 2002).
American Luminist artists from the East Coast produced paintings that were in contrast to Church's powerful landscapes of the Atlantic coastlines and shores of New England's lakes (Pohl, 2012).

The paintings reflected a light, which produced a radiance being dubbed "luminists" in 1954 by art historian John I. H. Baur (Pohl, 2012). The "luminists" landscape artists were: Fitz Hugh Lane (1804-65), John Frederick Kensett (1816-72), and Martin Johnson Head (1819-1904) (Pohl, 2012). According to Pohl (2012), in Lane's, The Western Shore with Norman's Woe of 1862, Kensett's Beacon Rock, Newport Harbor of 1857, and the Heade's Thunder Storm on Narragansett Bay of 1868, "one senses not the bravura of a nation whose future lies to the west, but the reflectiveness of a nation whose past lies to the east and whose future is not yet resolved" (p. 161). The qualities of "luminist" painters were differentiated from the "pastoral, allegorical, and sublime landscapes" of Church, Cole and numerous artists (Pohl, 2012). According to Pohl (2012), a literary scholar named David C. Miller wrote, "the impersonality of many luminists paintings derives from the simplification and abstraction of forms and in evenness of the treatment of the entire composition that verges on a democratization of the picture plane" (p.161-62). Head's painting, Thunder Storm, reflected a nervousness and awkward silence that showed a blending with nature (Pohl, 2012). The symbolism that "luminists" artists

reflected in their paintings were of a people confronting a world preoccupied with their shoreline, land, and history to stop political turmoil and commercial development which might lead to conflict on the Eastern seaboard (Pohl, 2012).
The landscape paintings were responsible for leading people out West and expanding what we now call America. The artwork of many artists told a story of what life looked like back then and the hardships many people encountered thereafter. It was their only way to record their artistic sketches and landscape paintings that people could see to encourage growth and exploration. It combined features of American culture, growth, landscape, intellectual and spiritual life. Art became a way of how people worshiped God and chose to follow the path they were always destined for. The American vision of landscape art at the time embraced the physical, spiritual, and well-being of society showing the exploration of wilderness and some of the tragedies of change (Lewis, 2002).

References
Lewis, M. J. (2002). American sublime. New Criterion, 21(1), 27.
Miller, Angela L. The Empire of the Eye: Landscape Representation and American Cultural Politics, 1825-1875. Ithaca: Cornell UP, 1993. Print.
Novak, B. (1980). Nature and Culture: American Landscape and Painting, 1825-1875. New York: Oxford University Press.
Pohl, Frances K. Framing America: A Social History of American Art. New York, N.Y.: Thames & Hudson, 2002. Print.
Skrapits, J. C. (1994). The Nineteenth-Century Landscape through the Eyes of Two Masters. (Cover story). American Artist, 58(618), 20-76.