The Interplay of Light

How can light be used? Value is one of the most common pieces of composition. In two different movements light is used in two very different ways to represent two very different realities. The  French Impressionists and the Hudson River School are two movements of art that find light extremely important to their work and yet the way that light is portrayed varies greatly. Light for the impressionists is to display the everyday. The goal of light isn't to highlight the composition or to demonstrate the specific nature of an area. The whole painting is often bathed in light. Their shadows feel illusionary since they are often painted with the colors that the artist is seeing, not with some deep color that is often assumed to be their. The French Impressionists are really trying to portray the commonality and the everydayness of modern life. They are exploring new perspectives and finding ways to represent the common real imagery of life. The Hudson River School is using light in a completely different way. For them Light is to be a focal point it is the pinnacle of the composition. The goal of light is to signify the divine. They often create radiance around the heavenly figure or the church in the painting. The soft glowing quality of the lights that are painted in the hudson river school are luminescent just are we would think spiritual things would be. The goal of painting outdoors and painting scenery was not to connect us to the everyday and the ordinary but rather to the true nature of God. the Sublime existence of the divinity to be seen most fully through nature. 

Claude Monet, The Valley of the Nervia, 1884, Oil on canvas, 26 x 32 in. (66 x 81.3 cm), the Metropolitan Museum of Art 

This work of Monet is stunning to the eye because light plays a very large role in the composition. The whole painting feels airy and filled with a brightness.The light illuminates the entire work making the snow caps shine and the river sparkle. Every part of the composition plays a role in dispersing the light to the viewer. The focus is the whole of the ordinary, the beauty of nature as nature. This Monet serves as a quintessential contrast to the works of the Hudson River School’s displays of light. While this painting is still light it is not focused on some ethereal meaning of light but rather the lights presence itself as it appears to the world. 

Albert Bierstadt, A Storm in the Rocky Mountains, Mt. Rosalie, 1866, oil on canvas, 98 5/8 × 158 1/8 × 7 1/4 in, Brooklyn Museum 

This painting is a mass of stark contrasts and ominous uses of light and shadow. We see our eyes are immediately drawn to the bright swatch of light. This diagonal line of light makes it seem like the light is descending from above down to the earth in a mystical way. There is a distinct point of emphasis for our eyes to look at in this composition because of the use of light and dark value. Bierstadt really pulls this out for the viewer by creating such dark and foreboding clouds that frame the back of the painting. However, he leaves us with the impression of calm coming again through the descension of this almost divine light. 

Claude Monet, The Rouen Cathedral, The Portal (Sunlight), 1894, oil on canvas, 39 1/4 x 25 7/8 in. (99.7 x 65.7 cm), The Metropolitan Museum of Art

I find a cathedral to be an adept comparison piece to Bierstadt’s painting above. The contrast between these two is in subject matter and seems to have a strange reversal with the expression of the content. Monet is physically displaying a cathedral. This specific painting is one of many that Monet completed in his lifetime of this specific church. He painted it many many times in different lighting and seasons and it appears different each time. This specific one seems appropriate because of its bright white value. The building seems to radiate and reflect the light bounced onto it yet there does not seem to be any sort of divine work at play. It's a church bathed in sunlight, beautiful? Yes. Celestial? Not quite. This is contrasted to the work of the Hudson River school above where in nature we find a very glaring finger directed at the sublime. 

Asher B. Durand, The Beeches,1845, oil on canvas, 60 3/8 x 48 1/8 in. (153.4 x 122.2 cm), The Metropolitan Museum of Art

This is the featured work of the show. Again unlike the french impressionists there is very clear emphasis in the composition of the work through the use of light. We find the center path illumened by a radiant source of light which bathes the entire valley. At the focal point of this bright composition we find a small figure surrounded by sheep. While there is not a direct correlation to Christ Himself the narrative of a shepherd with his flock is not a subtle one. The existence of the divine is not hidden inside this painting but rather is the reason for it. Durand leaves us with the inspiration of Godliness through the being of nature guiding the viewer into a reverence focused towards God that only nature could produce. 

Alfred Sisley, Allée of Chestnut Trees, 1878, oil on canvas, 19 3/4 in. × 24 in. (50.2 × 61 cm) 

This is a stunning work of art that depicts the beauties of everyday life. The scene shows people traveling down a gentle alleyway that is framed by trees and looks out on the body of water. The light in this composition is very representational of a sunny day. We find that the trees are casting shadows and the clouds are lit up with illuminated light. No figure becomes the object for the viewer by sunlight. The light isn’t a teacher or a guide for us, rather it lends a gentle and uncommanding presence that floats through the work. It never provides us with a sense of the divine but quite the opposite that life could be lived everyday with only seeing beauty as something worldly. 

Albert Bierstadt, The Rocky Mountains, Lander's Peak, 1863, oil on canvas, 73 1/2 x 120 3/4 in. (186.7 x 306.7 cm) 

Coming back to the landscape composition this work has several different scenes taking place. We see the high mountain peaks in the background then as we move forward we find a stunning waterfall. At the front of the composition there is a group of indigenous people tending to their horses and living their daily life. Again we find this very stark and bright diagonal light beam descending from the top right side of the sky. Notice how this is teaching another lesson about what is important and valuable. The light beam illuminates the waterfall which is a work of nature. It is in no way illuminating the people groups in the front of the painting. There is no elevation of everyday life.If we understand the work of the Hudson River School to be displaying the sublime importance of God in nature it's no wonder that the element that is made most prominent in the waterfall. 

Sources 

Rubin, James Henry. Impressionism and the modern landscape: Productivity, technology, and urbanization from Manet to Van Gogh. University of California Press, 2008

Cooper, James F. Knights of the Brush : The Hudson River School and the Moral Landscape. Hudson Hills Press, 1999

Howat, John K. The Hudson River and its Painters. American Legacy Press, 1983