THOMAS COLE'S JOURNEY: Atlantic Crossings

This magnificent book is a collaboration between The Metropolitan Museum of Art and The National Gallery London. It gives a detailed chronology of Cole's life, retracing his travels as documented in his journals, letters and sketchbooks and discussions of over 70 works demonstrating his major contribution to the history of Western art. You may not have heard of him and we certainly hadn't at Bibliophile, but on a recent buying trip with US suppliers we fell in love with the gentle colours and scenes of this talented landscape artist. This book is a major re-examination of the father of the Hudson River School in relation to his European roots and travels. Thomas Cole (1801-1848) is celebrated as the greatest American landscape artist of his generation. Previous scholarship has emphasised the American aspects of his identity, and never before has the British-born artist been presented as an international figure. This special large monograph emphasises his travels in England and Italy 1829 to 1832 and his crucial interactions with such painters as Turner and Constable. The tome explores his renowned paintings The Oxbow (1836) and The Course of Empire cycle (1834-36) together with magnificent oils on canvas like Titan's Goblet of 1833, View of Florence from San Miniato 1837, his chalk drawings from the Acropolis in Athens and closer to his home a distant view of Niagara Falls with a moody sky and tranquil waters and two figures on a ravine which appear to be Native American Indians. Another mountain landscape is his scene from The Last of the Mohicans novel which the artist painted. As a teenager in Chorley, Lancashire, Cole worked as an engraver on the woodblocks used to apply patterns to calico, which explains his appreciation of colour. Technical comparisons are made throughout with paint samples mounted in cross sections from the Oxbow and the Consummation of Empire magnified, a look at paint techniques and materials, the influence of industrial England where Cole was born (near Manchester), and the influence of Turner is made in comparison throughout the book, complete with gorgeous colour images. Combining Cole's passion for the American wilderness and his horror of the industrial revolution in Britain, this led him to create works that offer a distinctive even dissident response to the economic and political rise of the United States, and the ecological changes then underway. 254 colour illustrations. 288 huge pages, 24.9 x 28.2cm.