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Sixty Years' Memories of Art and Artists XVIII . CHURCH was just commencing his career, but had not yet produced his now well-known works. He was exceedingly faithful and sure in his drawing, and positive in his touch. I had seen in an exhibition in New York a little painting by Church of a cottage with poplar trees, a road, a place for weighing hay and other accessories. I did not know him, and this was the first work of his I had seen. A year after this I happened to be in a Vermont village. From the place where I stopped it looked strangely familiar to me. The cottage, the poplar trees, the road, the hayscales made me think I had been there before, but no, I had not, and I found it was Church's picture over again, the actual thing he had so truly rendered. It was marvellous, such a production. This sure and certain drawing of what facts were before him, painted with great skill and knowledge made him a master of positive effects such as few men possess. When he painted " The Heart of the Andes " he did it with all the knowledge of the facts. He knew the flora of the country, and the whole thing was rendered with skill of detail and form. The critics said it was not broadly treated; truly it was not, and perhaps it was too literal a rendering of facts, and wanting in higher poetic treatment, but it was a beautiful and interesting picture all the same. He sent his picture of Niagara Falls to the French International Exhibition of 1867, where it received a gold medal. A pupil of Gerome, a friend of mine, told me what Gerome said of it: "Ca commence la bas" was his remark, intimating that the artists over here were beginning to do well in their own way. He said nothing about the numberless imitations of French masters. Thomas Cole was no doubt the father of this Hudson River School, and in some respects he painted better and more forcible pictures than any of his followers. His earlier translations of American scenery were vigorous works, especially his rendering of autumn tints. He gave us this phase of nature in its graver and more subdued brilliancy, full of incident, subjected to his thought and more thoroughly American than any landscape work perhaps yet accomplished. What his poetic mind sought to do later-to illustrate allegory through landscape form-was comparatively a failure, because such a thing is hardly within the province of landscape art. A.B. Durand was to begin with an engraver, and a skillful one too. His use of the burin was masterly, and guided by a sure knowledge of drawing, as witness his reproduction of Vanderlyn's painting of Ariadne. I have an impression of this plate, and value it highly as it bears its place well by the side of any modern work. But Durand was attracted to landscape work, and had a successful career. He was at first influenced by Cole's work, but gradually emancipated himself by a constant study of nature, and formed a broad style of his own. His pictures were especially valuable from their strong characterization of American forest trees, giving his wood interiors a true primeval look, with no uncertainty as to the name and quality of each tree. His many studies from nature have a true out-of-door look, and are firmly and vigorously painted. I suppose Casilear's work must be classed in the Hudson River School. He too was an engraver, and wielded the burin with delicacy and feeling for many years. He visited Europe, and studied and observed in Paris, but at last he forsook engraving for landscape work, and has had a most successful career, His pictures are more delicate and refined than either Cole's or Durand's, but not so vigorous. There is not a lack of Sweetness of tone and pervading color, for his skies are luminous, and his distances tender and melting. In fact, there is a poetic pastoral charm in all his work, pleasing to the eye, and possessing beautiful qualities. He can only be reproached with a want of vigorous treatment. Richard Hubbard, a painter, who probably will be classed with the foregoing, was also an artist of original ideas. He had true feeling for harmonious color which permeated all his work. He was a close student of nature, and would work for days upon a small canvas trying to interpret the scene in its most intricate aspects. This he did not do for the picture he obtained, but to gain knowledge. His canvases were not crowded with details, but simple in arrangement, with a charming scheme of color. He tried to keep with the times in manner of painting, and succeeded in doing so. Sanford R. Gifford is also classed with this school. He was an artist of poetic temperament, and his pictures are flooded with atmosphere and light as well as color. He seemed to delight in rich sunset tints, to paint mountains misty, and far away in space. To the student of today, his work may appear to be wanting in solidity of form and modeling. William Hart also used to paint mountain scenery in a similar vein but with more positive color and decision of form ill matters of detail and tree drawing, but with less poetic imagination. In later years he has given his time to cattle painting, in which branch of art he has been successful. Albert Bierstadt must be spoken of in this connection, although not exactly belonging to the same class of painters. Certainly he cannot be ignored in making a list of prominent men whose works have had an effect on the landscape art of this country. His first real training was had in Dusseldorf under the immediate eye of Leutze. When he came home his pictures had a decided look of the school, but after gazing at nature at home his manner changed, and the Dusseldorf shackles dropped off, and he painted some decidedly American works. His first Rocky Mountain picture caused quite a sensation in Boston. It was clear, sparkling and brilliant with a super abundance of detail. Then followed in later years his California works, very ambitious works, huge canvases, full of the details of our western scenery, but, necessarily, too map-like. He is a skillful and rapid painter, and has I think been unjustly underrated by the new school. Thomas Hill has all the facility of Bierstadt, and can make more pictures in a given time than any man I ever met. In one afternoon of three hours in the White Mountain forests I have seen him produce a study, 12x20 in size, full of details and brilliant light. There is his greatest strength, and his White Mountain wood studies have not been excelled. Other men might be mentioned whose works have influenced American landscape art before the students from abroad came home to work a revolution. George Inness, of whom I have already spoken, has always been intensely American in feeling. His residence in France and Italy did not make him falter in his allegiance to his country. He learned much abroad, it is true, but his knowledge thus gained he has used in truthfully illustrating our own scenery. He stands today confessedly at the head of the list of American landscapists, and his influence has been great on younger men. His example is a good one to follow, by all students coming home from foreign study, not to paint French pictures, but to trust to what nature can afford them here. |
