Frederic Edwin Church THE 19th Century American landscape artist.

Mid-term has set in and my drawing board has been cleared away until Monday next week.

The time for drawing and creating seriously diminished.

The time for discovering and relishing in what others have done with a mastery strangely enough increased.

I'm not one for landscapes...well not until I  (virtually) saw Churches' 7 foot wide Aurora Borealis. This masterpiece is anchoring the To the Ends of the Earth, Painting the Polar Landscape  at the Peabody Essex Museum. (Runs from 8 November through 1 March, 2009.)

I had to dig further.

I did

and... found a master. 

The purpose of this post is not to bore you with my interpretation of his work, or the impact it has on me, or even to tell you that he was born in Connecticut on May 4th 1826 and died 74 years later in New York his reputation  firmly established and incredibly well respected. 

The purpose is rather to let you enjoy in silence the magnificence of his work.

However, before I bring on this silence, let me just throw in a few jumbled (loud) words so descriptive of his grand legacy.

Ephemeral, extraordinary, meticulous, topographically exact, greying greens, "Wagnerian Weather" (Adrian Searle, The Guardian), romantic, phenomenal, grandeur, dramatical, substancial, technical genius, immense, magnificent...

Enough said... Here is the jaw dropping painting for your own special viewing followed by a selection of the Master's work.




"Niagara", 1867

"Iceberg Flotante",  1859, Frederic Church.

"Cotopaxi", 1862

"Vale of St Thomas", 1865

"Icebergs and Wreck in Sunset", 1860

"Mount Katahdin from Millinocket Camp"

"Niagara from Canadian side", 1857

"View from Olana in the Snow", 1873

"Heart of the Andes" 

Brilliant stuff!

Hope you enjoyed your virtual"getaway" as much as I did.

Back soon, 

cheerio until then.

All images are from Wikimedia and Museum Syndicate.

Comments

Tracy Hall said…
Wow. I've seen the northern lights but he actually managed to paint them. Thats quite an iceberg too. Many thanks for pointing his work out!
11:05 pm
Grangry said…
Srunning! These have an almost SciFi book jacket feel to them. Certainly stretched my coffee break!
10:38 am
Anonymous said…
We think he's great too! Here's a little "virtual" trip to Olana.
http://tinyurl.com/68b8sx

Best,
Carri
1:51 pm
Unknown said…
Tracy: I agree totally! After seeing the Northern lights in Sweden I never believed they could be reproduced...Church prooves me wrong!

Kay: His work is definately the perfect reason for having an extra cup of coffee:)

Carri: welcome to Black on Grey on White. Thank you for the link...would love to visit Olana. Seems to be as special as the artist himself.
10:02 am
A Colorful World said…
My favorites when I was young were the Impressionists, and then one day in the National Gallery, I stepped into a room and was almost literally knocked off my feet by a work of one of the romantic era painters (boy, I wish I knew which one!) that covered an entire wall and looked like the light was emanating FROM the canvas! The Romantics, and Hudson River painters became my new favorites. This is a wonderful series of photos of Church's paintings, and I enjoyed them all so much! Thank you for posting them!

Marie
1:27 am
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