DOI Heft:
No. 199 (October, 1909)
DOI Artikel:Mechlin, Leila: Contemporary american landscape painting
DOI Seite / Zitierlink: https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.20968#0025
THE STUDIO
ONTEMPORARY AMERICAN
LANDSCAPE PAINTING. BY
L. MECHLIN.
If it is true, as Barrie has suggested in his
" Margaret Ogilvy," that the end and aim of all
art is to open the eyes of those who will look to
beautiful thoughts and beautiful things, then it
must be admitted that the landscape painters of
America are artists indeed. Primarily they are
discoverers and interpreters — men passionately
loving nature and striving through their works to
impart to others their emotions; not as others
have done, but in a way distinctively their own.
They have not always succeeded, nor invariably
done well. Being thrown almost inevitably upon
their own resources, their expression has at times
been crude and immature ; but it has been frank,
sincere and true, and this has given it distinction.
And, furthermore, their pictures have been painted
largely without regard for the market, without
intent to please, and while in many instances they
have been found lacking in pictorial interest they
have not failed to carry conviction.
As the love of pure landscape is commonly a
token of ripened development, it is, perhaps, a
little perplexing to comprehend why America, an
exceedingly young, if precocious, nation, should
have made her largest contribution to the art of
the world in this particular field. Possibly, how-
ever, a reverent love of the outdoor world is the
pioneer's heritage—perchance youth has engendered
daring. Be that as it may, without doubt it is
true that the view-point of the American landscape:
painters is, and has been almost from the first,,
different from that of other landscape painters,,
inasmuch as it completely overlooks the immediate:
relationship of nature to man. John Richardi
the golden afternoon" by
XLVIII. No. 199.—October, 1909. 2
ONTEMPORARY AMERICAN
LANDSCAPE PAINTING. BY
L. MECHLIN.
If it is true, as Barrie has suggested in his
" Margaret Ogilvy," that the end and aim of all
art is to open the eyes of those who will look to
beautiful thoughts and beautiful things, then it
must be admitted that the landscape painters of
America are artists indeed. Primarily they are
discoverers and interpreters — men passionately
loving nature and striving through their works to
impart to others their emotions; not as others
have done, but in a way distinctively their own.
They have not always succeeded, nor invariably
done well. Being thrown almost inevitably upon
their own resources, their expression has at times
been crude and immature ; but it has been frank,
sincere and true, and this has given it distinction.
And, furthermore, their pictures have been painted
largely without regard for the market, without
intent to please, and while in many instances they
have been found lacking in pictorial interest they
have not failed to carry conviction.
As the love of pure landscape is commonly a
token of ripened development, it is, perhaps, a
little perplexing to comprehend why America, an
exceedingly young, if precocious, nation, should
have made her largest contribution to the art of
the world in this particular field. Possibly, how-
ever, a reverent love of the outdoor world is the
pioneer's heritage—perchance youth has engendered
daring. Be that as it may, without doubt it is
true that the view-point of the American landscape:
painters is, and has been almost from the first,,
different from that of other landscape painters,,
inasmuch as it completely overlooks the immediate:
relationship of nature to man. John Richardi
the golden afternoon" by
XLVIII. No. 199.—October, 1909. 2