[Torie]

Much better Kincade, but those mountains are just so geologically phony in the first one, that I can't stand it. And mountains don't look that way the light. In fact, the entire lighting effect is ersatz. The second painting is much more pleasing to me.

[AnAmericanMother]

Well, Bierstadt is not of the first rank . . . but he is SO MUCH better than Kinkade!

I prefer Cole, Church and Durand to Bierstadt, but I got hold of his paintings first.

[Republicanprofessor]

Re post 72 and the works by Bierstadt and Cole. Cole's second image was taken from a real spot, Kaaterskill Falls in upstate NY. Several of his first landscapes are from this very spot.

Bierstadt relied more on formula. I once did a paper in grad school comparing him to Frederick Edwin Church, who was much better and worked from real images not formulas learned in Germany (before Bierstadt came to the U.S.). I still like some of Bierstadt's works of Yosemite, but in some of his general mountain images, the mountains fade so much in the center of his piece that nothing remains.

[painter]

And mountains don't look that way the light. In fact, the entire lighting effect is ersatz.

How do you know? To me it looks like daybreak on a early spring morning when the sun is just starting to burn off the morning fog.

I happen to think the painting is beautiful.

[From many - one.]

Can't agree.

Reminds me of Adirondacks. I've seen that kind of lighting outdoors a lot on east coast area hikes.

[subterfuge]

MY untrained eye sees it completely differently. The first painting looks kind of real and the second one looks like a disjointed mess. It looks like the waterfall in the foreground is being pushed up the back side of the mountain and spilling on to the front of the mt. the waterfall in the background seems to be coming from nowhere and going nowhere, fwiw.