Why Is Landscape Painting My Favorite Genre?

During the 19th Century, the landscape became a prominent medium for the concretization of various themes and different ideas. It became much more than only a background.

During most of art history, landscape paintings were considered a lesser genre. This is the traditional hierarchy of painting genres:

1. History painting, including historically significant, religious, mythological, or allegorical subjects

2. Portrait painting

3. Genre painting or scenes of everyday life

4. Landscape, seascape, and cityscape art

5. Animal painting

6. Still life

The Dutch theorist Samuel van Hoogstraten called Landscapists "common footmen in the Army of Art," Meaning that landscape painting is an essential but ordinary form of painting. Nothing "sublime" could come out of a landscape. However, in the late 18th Century and throughout the 19th Century, this would change. The Romantic era of painting placed the landscape's importance much higher in the hierarchy. For the first time in art history, it was no longer just a background but a medium for concretizing various feelings, emotions, and abstract ideas. Let’s have a look at some of the various themes expressed through landscape painting by prominent 19th Century painters.

Religion in Landscape

(Cross And Cathedral In The Mountains, Casper David Friedrich, 1811)

At the beginning of the 19th Century, Casper David Friedrich (1774-1840) revolutionized landscape painting. One of the most common themes he expressed using landscape was religion. As you can see in the “Cross And Cathedral In The Mountains,” Friedrich used symmetrical composition to make the cross the most important part of the picture. Friedrich implies that the position of the cross in the painting should be the position religion should have in our lives. And the bright, mystical aura above symbolizes salvation - the result of taking the ideas that the cross stands for seriously and consistently.

Notice that the landscape is only the platform upon which the religion theme is served. The dark landscape creates a strong contrast with the bright, shining cross. Showing the viewer that this life (our world of landscapes) is dark and the heavy stones symbolize that life is tough and filled with suffering.

Friedrich taught the art world that landscape doesn't only have to be nature for nature's sake. But much more than that. He showed that a painter could use the powerful elements of nature to portray an ideal. In that case, it was Christianity, but it could be any ideal.

Natural Drama

(The Eruption of Vesuvius, Johan Christian Dahl, 1826)

When Johan Christian Dahl (1788-1857) came to Dresden in 1818, he befriended Casper David Friedrich. They both share a similarity in style and technique; both believed that they must paint landscapes out of their inductive study of nature rather than learning the old academic methods of the landscape. Dahl did not use the landscape to concretize religious views. Instead, Dahl was interested in ships, prehistory, volcanos, waterfalls, etc. He also shared Friedrich's admiration for nature's immense scale and power, most famously concretized in Dahl's depictions of mount Vesuvius in Italy. Dahl viewed landscape painting as a means to portray drama and action. There's always something happening, always some contrast.

(Nordic Landscape With a Waterfall, Johan Christian Dahl, 1817)

This painting is an interesting example from his earlier days. Notice the structure of the composition. There is no symmetry here like there was in Friedrich. The tall naked tree on the left contrasts the massive trees farther away. It is also contrasting the travelers right next to it. It makes them seem small. The strong current of the waterfall is dynamic, but the tree is static. Dahl manages to make a possibly dull landscape an exciting and dynamic one.

Pure Natural Beauty

(Mount Corcoran, Albert Birestadt, 1877)

During the 19th Century, America was expanding westwards. Americans were setting foot on thousands and thousands of square miles of virtually untouched land for the first time in history. Not only was this a virgin land for man's conquest and development, but this was also a virgin land for art. The American artists in the 19th Century had a unique privilege and previously unfaced challenge. They were to first to paint these landscapes.

Albert Bierstad (1830-1902) learned painting in Düsseldorf. Therefore, he was influenced by the German romantic traditions of landscape painting established by Casper David Friedrich and others such as Andreas Achenbach (1815-1910). In “Mount Corcoran,” we can see Bierstad’s massive admiration for nature's beauty and scale. This style helps Bierstad concretize the feeling he must have felt when standing by that mountain. A sense of something so sublime, vast, powerful, and beautiful.

This painting concretizes that sublime feeling through pure natural beauty. No human figures or other symbolic objects are present. The painter didn't even need to change anything. He painted what was in from of him. This example shows that for a landscape to be interesting and powerful, it doesn't necessarily need to have anything man-made inside of it. Nature can have a very calming effect. Sometimes we don't want to be surrounded by any man. Sometimes we want to sit in a large forest or by the sea and stop for a moment to think, to relax. This peaceful and calming moment is what this painting is about.

Should Man Rule Nature?

(The Cornfield, John Constable, 1826)

John Constable (1776-1837) was an English painter, mostly known for depicting the English countryside. Constable was born in a small village in Suffolk. His father was a corn merchant. As you may see in almost all of Constable’s landscapes, this type of landscape was his favorite subject to depict in his works. During most of his adult life, he lived in London. But he liked to spend his summers painting in his childhood village. 

‘The Cornfield’ depicts a young boy drinking from a small water pond. There is a small path leading to a cornfield. On the path, a dog is herding a small pack of sheep. In the cornfield itself, there is a male figure. The bright weather and the fact that the boy is drinking in such a manner may suggest that the scene takes place amid summer. 

This painting romanticizes rural English life. A simple life, virtually untouched by the industrial revolution, a revolution that was booming right when Constable created his art. But if you did not have that as historical background, when looking at this painting, you, the viewer, will have no idea about that. This scene could easily be taken from 300 years prior. And that is exactly the point. Constable was not a fan of industrial life. He wanted man to live a harmonious existence on earth. To peacefully co-exist with nature. Not as its subject but also not as its ruler.

Can Man Even Survive Nature?

(Winter Landscape, Casper David Friedrich, 1811)

While Constable stressed the harmony between man and nature, Friedrich and others stressed the constant struggle of man versus nature. It is an interesting theme because it could be interpreted in two very opposing ways. It could be either man heroically facing nature — it could show man as strong and able to deal with the elements of nature. A man who is determined to command nature. Or, it could be interpreted as man being weak and small against nature.

This debate could almost always arise when discussing Friedrich’s paintings. That is because we can never see a face. Rückfiguren, or “back figures,” is the name given to this way of portraying human figures. It makes things much more interesting because we, as the viewers, can’t see the man's expression, and therefore we can only use other hints, such as his posture, to determine if he is scared or confident when facing nature.

I want to ask you, my reader, what do you think about the man in the picture? Is he afraid of nature? or is he confident in his ability to deal with the situation? To me, it looks like he has come prepared. It seems very cold, but the figure doesn’t look disturbed by it. He appears to carry some weapon. Maybe he is looking out for wolves? The question is: is he hunting the wolves, or is it the wolves hunting him? Regardless of the answer, the question is intriguing.

(Winter Coast, Winslow Homer, 1890)

This is another example by the American painter Winslow Homer (1836-1910) of a similar setting. The main difference is the perspective. Now we can see the man’s face. He looks confident. His legs are pointing forward; he is strong and able. He has already hunted a goose. He has his rifle firmly held. This man can deal with nature.

Observe how by placing a figure in a simple landscape setting, we can learn so much about this figure and, more profoundly, what are the painter’s views on man’s life. How should man deal with nature, and what kind of a creature is man? Can man be a hero? Or is he small and insignificant? All this (and much more) we can learn from landscape painting.

(By the end of my podcast with Luc Travers, we discussed this painting in further detail)

Loneliness

(The Lonely Tree, Casper David Friedrich, 1822)

Another closely related and interrelated theme with the previous one is loneliness. Once in nature, you are much more isolated from other people than in a city. Like the last theme, loneliness can be interpreted in different opposing ways: it could either be man by himself or man with himself. By saying man with himself, I mean a man who wants to be alone. Maybe he wants an escape from the noise and stress of living in a busy city, or perhaps he wants some time to think by himself, surrounded by the beauty of nature. By saying man by himself, I mean a man who doesn’t want to be alone. Maybe it is the painter expressing his inner feeling of loneliness and even possibly grief.

Conclusion

There are many various themes and ideas that an artist can express through landscape painting. What I find most interesting about these examples is the discussion that can arise from figuring out what the painter talks about. Does he think man is a heroic being who can win over nature’s many challenges? Or does he think the opposite? Does the painter think being alone is a good thing? or is he trying to express his misery? Should man take advantage of nature to improve his life, or should he try to live in peaceful harmony with nature? All these philosophical questions can arise from landscape paintings. And that is what makes them so intresting.

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If you have read this far, please leave a comment, share with me some of your thoughts about the paintings I mentioned. Do you agree or disagree with my analysis? Let me know, and if you enjoyed reading my work, please consider sharing and subscribing.

Thank you,

Yonatan

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