The Course of Empire: Thomas Cole's Warning to America

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tA2bnof3-D8 ^ | February 9, 2012 | Robb Bomboy

[Joe 6-pack]

"Thomas Cole, America's premier landscape painter of the 1820's and 1830's, constructed the idea for his series, The Course of Empire, from a variety of influences. He began his intense study of Europe and its art in 1829 by sailing to England, where he met and talked with influential artists such as J.M.W. Turner and John Martin. He studied the works of those artists and others in the British galleries of the time. Scholars recognize today that those artists' influence upon him was strikingly pervasive. Cole also felt the perishability of man's works when he traveled in Europe and saw firsthand the ruins of the Roman Empire. There, sitting among the broken columns, he meditated on man's works, ambitions, and the course of the future. Literary sources of the day, especially Lord Byron's Childe Harold, also influenced his thinking and his artistic consciousness. Moreover, anyone studying his work today must continually bear in mind that Cole lived and worked in his own time, reacting to the political atmosphere of America during the 1820's and 1830's. Jacksonian Democracy had come to dominance, an ascendancy that Cole despised and believed was leading the United States down the wrong path. At the same time, artistically, he wanted to raise landscape painting to the stature that history painting enjoyed. To do that, and to comment on the America he saw around him, he employed a cyclical theory of history to incorporate large moral lessons into his paintings. All of those influences led Cole to paint his epic series as a warning to American society about the trappings of empire, conquest, and domination. Using his own words from time to time in this essay, I will outline the artist's warning."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tA2bnof3-D8

[Joe 6-pack]

Images from:http://web.sbu.edu/theology/bychkov/cole.html

The Course of Empire, The Savage State, 1834

The Course of Empire, The Pastoral or Arcadian State, 1834

The Course of Empire, The Consummation of Empire, 1835-36

The Course of Empire, Destruction, 1836

The Course of Empire, Desolation, 1836

[Don Corleone]

The picture of the Statue of Liberty from “Planet of the Apes” seems suitable here.

[Joe 6-pack]

Actually, this picture is probably more suitable. Next stop on the SCOTUS train:

[ETL]

Albert Bierstadt was my favorite of the Hudson River School of landscape painting. The first 3 below are his. The last one, Frederic Church, another of the very best.

[Ruy Dias de Bivar]

Or this from LOGAN"S RUN.

[Joe 6-pack]

Yes, I’m a fan of the Hudson River painters as well, but I was posting this more for the political/cultural relevance than for art historical reasons. The video points out Cole’s antipathy to Jacksonian democracy and it’s threat to stable republicanism.

[BlueLancer]

Fallout 3

[Joe 6-pack]

"Our only means of judging the future is the past. We see that nations have sprung from obscurity, risen to glory and decayed. Their rise in general has been marked by virtue, their decadence by vice, vanity and licentiousness. Let us Beware."

~Thomas Cole

[ETL]

I figured that, or something like that. I just look for any cheap opportunity to showcase these folks’ amazing talents. :)

[Joe 6-pack]

If you were going to showcase Church, you should have posted his, “Twilight in the Wilderness,” which is truly his best work. I’ve seen it in person, and he somehow took a piece of canvas and made it glow. Viewing it in person is really the only reason for anybody to go to Cleveland, but it is worth it.

[ETL]

Re: "Twilight in the Wilderness"

As incredible as it is, I don't know if I would say it's his best, though. He and some of the others were such over-the-top great painters.

[ETL]

Another nice one by Church...

I have a lot of these paintings on my PC, but didn't label many of them, and so I don't know who did what. I'd have to look it up elsewhere.

________________________________

Mountains of Ecuador - Frederic Church

[wastoute]

I recall vividly these great landscapes of the West in which I grew up. The immense vastness of the natural beauty just fills and thrills the soul. It is the backdrop upon which our lives of Liberty have been painted and I can’t help but wonder that of course these folks who clamor for the destructive influences do so because they never had the experience. In the parts of our country these folks come from one never gets to experience that stirring of the soul.

[Joe 6-pack]

As something of dilettante artist in my own right, I've long been fascinated by Bierstadt's treatment of water (and wildlife) in Seal Rock...

[ETL]

Church wasn't bad with water himself...

Niagara

[ETL]

Not sure who did this one. But it's probably Bierstadt or Church.

[Joe 6-pack]

I’ve seen that one in person as well...it is a truly impressive work.

[wastoute]

Breathtaking! Thanks.

[ETL]

Niagara Falls, from the American Side by Frederic Edwin Church

[Joe 6-pack]

As I recall, Church’s paintings were considered so accurate, there were some geologists who actually used them when calculating the erosion rates of the falls.