Albert BIERSTADT - Rocky Mountains (1863)

 

Rocky Mountains

1863
Oil painting on canvas (180x306 cm)
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

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At the beginning of the nineteenth century, American artists had a strong interest in American nature, giving much space to the green hills and dense forests that covered much of the territory.

This happened at a time of strong change that would irreversibly transform the landscape: industrialization. The threat of the railway and mechanization were highly concrete, the response of some Americans was not long in coming and manifested itself in this nostalgic Art that was ahead of its time.

One of the most important masters able to create these romantic views (in the sense of Romanticism) was Albert Bierstadt. A main feature of his Art was that of using large canvases as a support, which he used to cover with extremely detailed and precise images, showing the American Nature of the most remote and inaccessible places, ranging from the Rocky Mountains to the grandeur of Yosemite. Valley.

Bierstadt was of German descent and moved to America at an early age.

His work is to be understood as the only romantic leap before the arrival of the railway and the great change.

Comparing artists: Church, Cole, Cozens, Daubigny, Hobbema, T. Rousseau