Around the 1850's to 1870's, an American art movement known as Luminism took shape. Its focus was on light and landscapes. First coined in 1940's and 50's by John Baur and Maxim Karolik, this movement typically featured serene landscapes with calm, hazy skies and placid waters. These works were painted with intricate detail that often hid the paint strokes of the artist. The paintings can be compared to the poems and essays of Ralph Waldo Emerson (such as Nature) in how they depict nature and people's interaction with it. There is a reverence for nature and the viewer is often caught up in its magnificence. Luminism includes painters such as John Frederick Kensett and Albert Bierstadt.
John Frederick Kensett is a lesser known, but still important, luminist artist. He is a second generation American painter who has ties to, but was not part of, the Hudson River School. His paintings generally depict forests, mountains, calm lakes or oceans, and sky. Kensett was a master of depicting light in his paintings. Like most Luminist, the light is hazy and calm but sometimes brings a sense of tension. In this way, light itself plays a narrative role. The lighting in his paintings is capable of setting the mood of the painting
The Old Pine, Darien, Connecticut, John Frederick Kensett, 1872, Oil on canvas, 34 3/8 x27 1/4 in., 74.38
In this piece, Kensett renders the delicate, twisting, and dense nature of the pine and the forest behind it in exquisite detail. The use of dark greens and browns help contrast the light, airy greys and blues of the sky, rocks, and water around the pine and forest. The viewer gets the sense of a cloudy day along the coastline through the limited color palette Kensett uses. This invokes a moody feel. It feels as if might rain at any second.
Gathering Storm on Long Island Sound, John Frederick Kensett, 1872, Oil on canvas, 34 1/4 x 27 1/4 in., 74.39
In a similar vein to The Old Pine, Darien, Connecticut, Kensett makes a tree (in this case, group of trees) overlooking a cloudy sky and placid water the main subject. A similar use of light makes a believable air of cloudiness in the painting. It differs, however, in that the light seems darker and creates a sense of tension that makes the viewer feel as if the clouds amassing in the painting are about to break out in storm. It is broken, however, with a patch of light highlighting the group of trees and shore in the background.
Painted around the same time as Kensett's works, this work of Eakins shows the various approaches of depicting light that American artists took at the time. Eakins depicts a clear day without any haze. The water is still calm but is broken up by the rowers. Reflections of the landscape in the water are clear unlike Kensett's which are much fuzzier. The sky has only a few clouds which helps make the light in the painting much clearer and stronger. Eakins uses light to illuminate his subjects of the rowers and doesn't use it to create a mood.
Lake George, John Frederick Kensett, 1869, Oil on canvas, 44 1/8 x 66 3/8 in., 15.30.61
This piece, painted three years prior to the other Kensett works in this collection, shows the common theme of reverence for the nature present in many works of the Luminist. The moody, hazy sky reflecting in the water has more variation caused by the landmass than the other works of Kensett previously shown. The hazy, cloudy sky creates a sense of grandeur and awe in the painting. It compliments the serenity of the water thus making the whole painting feel serene.
Sunrise on the Matterhorn, Albert Bierstadt, after 1875, Oil on canvas, 58 1/2 x42 5/8 in., 66.114
A fellow Luminist, Bierstadt depicts the hazy mountain range and outcropping of trees in a similar manner to Kensett. The conifer trees are reminiscent of The Old Pine and Gathering Storm on Long Island Sound. Similar to The Old Pine, the foreground is much darker and dense to the light and airy background. The scene is also placid and calm like many of Kensett's (and fellow Luminist) works. The warm, cozy red on sunset bouncing off the snow of the mountain's grandeur and almost heavenly presence. The darkness of the foreground not only contrasts the main subject of the mountain, its dark lighting adds a mysterious quality of nature to the painting.
Not only does this work differ in its composition, but also in the way it is rendered. The more apparent brush strokes affect how the light is displayed in the work. The contrast between the lights and darks are much harsher with the shadows being near black. The light in the painting seems much more scattered like it would be when going through the canopy of a similar forest. The lighting helps to highlight the warmth of the forest and the light trickling through it. This work loses the haziness present in other works of Kensett adding to the light dappling effect.
References:
Hartel, Herbert R. "Luminism, Transcendentalism, and Abstraction in the Landscape Paintings of John F. Kensett." Source: Notes in the History of Art 21, no. 4 (2002): 3-10.
Novak, Barbara. American Painting of the Nineteenth Century: Realism, Idealism, and the American Experience. 3rd ed.,. Oxford: Oxford University Press,2007.
Beebe, Ann, "Light is the First of Painters: Ralph Waldo Emerson and the Luminism of John Frederick Kensett", Religion and the Arts 23, (2019), 467-488
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