New England Scenery
Thomas Cole (American, born England, 1801–1848)
1839
- Medium
- Oil on canvas
- Classification
- Painting
- Dimensions
- 57.1 × 46.7 cm (22 1/2 × 18 3/8 in.)
- Culture
- New England
- Museum
- Art Institute of Chicago, Arts of the Americas
- Credit line
- Nickerson Collection
- Rights
- Public domain (CC0), as the museum states it.
- Who can see it
- Little Ones profiles and older: it shows gentle subjects for the very young. How works are placed
View at the Art Institute of Chicago
About this work
Although Thomas Cole is best known for his scenes of the American wilderness, he also rendered pastoral vistas of cultivated landscapes. This work depicts New Hampshire’s White Mountains, an area that Cole traveled to and painted on numerous occasions, as did other 19th-century landscape artists. The prominent church spire at middle distance emphasizes the role of religion in agrarian society and the glow of the low sun expresses a sense of optimism for a rural America. The painting conveys an ideal that was increasingly far from reality, however, as the United States was then being transformed by rapid urbanization and the Industrial Revolution.
Description © Art Institute of Chicago, CC BY 4.0
