 Fig 5. Frederic Edwin Church, 1826-1900 Mountain Landscape, ca. 1849, oil of canvas, 14-1/2 x 19-3/4 inches Brauer Museum of Art, Percy H. Sloan Trust, 53.1.107 |
With the rise of American wealth and
industrial productivity, fueled by the labor of immigrant workers and a vast landscape
rich in natural resources, a new symbol of American identity emerged in the twentieth
century: the city. The American frontier had been for generations a providential
affirmation of American national destiny, and had been captured in the sublime style of
landscape painting by Frederic Church and Albert Bierstadt. In the Brauer's Mountain
Landscape by Church (ca. 1849; fig. 5), for example, the incandescent clouds and the
glowing face of the mountain suggest an act of revelation as the day passes into night, or
as the dawn first arrives. ...[continue] |