Written by: Raina Tian
Spotted in the window of a bookstore, a few paintings would begin what would become the United States’ first art movement. The Hudson River School, although the movement technically began in the mid 19th century, had its roots in 1825 when Thomas Cole moved to New York City where he immediately began to frequent a tourist hotel in the Catskill mountains. There, he would sketch scenes of the landscape and Hudson River from which he would then paint from in his New York studio. From there, he was discovered when his paintings drew the eye of influential artists in a bookstore window. Cole began his landscape paintings in a period in which an appreciation for the beauty of the wilderness was being cultivated through literature. The Hudson River School paralleled these themes through its depictions of natural wonders throughout the world, at times flaunting the American west through a nationalistic lens. The growth of the tourism industry reflected the public’s desire to escape the frenzy of urban working life, and the Hudson River School provided glimpses of the idyllic beauty of nature. In the early stages of the Hudson River School, Cole’s hand was heavily guided by the British theory of the Sublime, which advocated for a fear of nature’s power, and this was emulated through his student Frederic Edwin Church, one of the leaders and most notable figures of the movement. However, following Cole’s death, Asher Brown Durand emphasized a shift towards a more naturalistic approach towards landscape painting. Plein-air, the gentle manipulation of light to create a heavenly appearance among the scenes, became a standard in painted scenes. The resulting paintings utilized both idealism and realism, as the end paintings were composites of sketches done in the wilderness and the artist’s hand in New York. The nature of these scenes aimed to invoke strong emotions of awe and admiration in the viewer. Frederic Edwin Church and Albert Bierstadt heavily contributed to the popularity of and worked in the height of the Hudson River School, Church depicting wonders throughout the Americas and Bierstadt throughout the west. America’s artistic influences turned to France following the Civil War, and with the rise of Impressionism, realism became artistically unfashionable. Following Church and Bierstadt’s deaths at the turn of the century, the Hudson River School fell into anonymity. Citations: https://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/hurs/hd_hurs.htm https://www.britannica.com/art/Hudson-River-school https://www.theartstory.org/movement-hudson-river-school.htm
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ContributorsJACQUELINE YU is the co-founder of the MLWGS art history online magazine. She is an incredible artist and devotes much of her time to both participating in, experiencing, and appreciating art. Archives
April 2019
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