Cropsey the Romantic (Unit 4)

Cropsey the Romantic


The romanticism movement of the 1800’s proved to be one of the most prolific time periods in terms of several mediums of art. Literature, music, and art itself were revolutionized at this time and have only continued to improve since. With the movement beginning in Europe these mediums were instilled with the knowledge of the past, religion, and folklore. With this knowledge the authors, musicians, and artists of this time created masterpieces that were intended to capture and then convey these topics through amazing detail paired with a somber, or surreal, environment. This movement then moved to North America and took on a completely new identity. For instance, with his piece Eagle Cliff, Franconia Notch, New Hampshire, Jasper Francis Cropsey differentiated himself from European Romanticism by breaking away from the past, divine serenity, and folklore in favor of a landscape focus that uses vibrant colors to allow nature to captivate for itself.

The romanticism movement came to be as aftermath from the French Revolution. Young European artists moved on from the stoic and somber style of neoclassicism in order to create masterpieces of emotional intensity (Romantic). This entire movement took hold and was able to successfully begin in Germany.

It was during between 1800 and 1850 that the Romanticism movement spread through Germany and its generation of young artists. In Germany there are two primary topics that are covered in the art: divine serenity and Germanic mythology and folklore (Romanticism). Divine serenity, however, was by far the more popular of the two.

In terms of Germanic romanticism art and how it portrayed divine serenity there are really two schools of thought. There’s the school that works in order to depict symbolic landscape as well as the Nazarene’s whose work focuses on the style of medieval religious art.

From the school of symbolic landscape came Germany’s most prolific romantic artist Caspar David Friedrich. Friedrich was known for creating masterpieces that hover between a subtle mystical feeling and a sense of melancholy solitude and estrangement (Romanticism). One of Friedrich’s greatest works is called Wanderer Above a Sea of Fog and there is a quote from Friedrich that explain his purpose for the painting perfectly. He said “Preserve a pure, childlike sensibility, and follow without question your own inner voice, for it is the divine in us, and does not lead us astray” (Schrauzer). The reason this perfectly explains his painting is because in the painting Friedrich depicts a man standing atop a mountain and looking out upon unexplored wilderness. This man, however, does not cower or look frightened in any way. He stands on that mountain with his head held high and an air of confidence surrounding him. It’s as if Friedrich’s saying that even though this wanderer had no intention of travelling to this area he travelled knowing that wherever he went the lord willed it and is leading him on the correct path. That’s exactly what Friedrich and others from this school of symbolic landscape were working towards. While past paintings that focused on landscape were very secular in their character, Friedrich and his group revived them in a religious sense and uncovered unsuspected spiritual depths within the landscape (Schrauzer).

The Nazarenes, as opposed to their symbolic landscape counterparts, created pieces of art inspired by a medieval style that focused solely on the religious aspect rather than landscape merged with religion (Nazarenes). The leading figure for the Nazarenes was Johann Friedrich Overbeck (Romanticism). One of Overbeck’s works is a great example of this style of focusing on the religious act rather than religion within landscape. It’s called The Adoration of the kings and it’s depicting the moment the three wise men appeared in front of Mary and Joseph bearing gifts for the newborn baby Jesus (Adoration). What’s easy to notice is the sheer difference in detail and emotional intensity between Overbeck and Friedrich. Friedrich put painstaking detail in his landscape in order to provoke religious intensity while Overbeck doesn’t have much focus in his landscape and more focuses on the religious act itself. Overbeck put great detail in his depictions of people so as to accurately represent the events taking place.

Now, while there was a large artistic focus on the divine there was at the same time a minor focus on Germanic mythology and folklore. This is most notably because of Moritz von Schwind who became popular towards the end of German romanticism. One of Schwind’s most notable works comes from the Germanic folklore of the Erlking or “king of the fairies”. The New Oxford American Dictionary describes the Erlking as “a bearded giant or goblin who lures little children to the land of death” (Erlking). Schwind’s painting, however, isn’t based on the legend itself, but rather a poet’s depiction of the legend. Schwind painted this and aptly gave it the name of Illustration of Goethe’s ‘Erlkönig’. In Goethe’s Erlkönig you have a father riding home with his young son at night. During the ride the son starts to say that he’s hearing and seeing things that the father evidently can’t, but he comforts his son anyway. The poem progresses until the son announces he has been attacked. This prompts the father to ride faster, but when he arrives home he notices his son is dead (Der Erlkönig). In Schwind’s painting you see a father and son riding on a horse with spirits coming from the woods behind them. Most of these spirits are feminine in nature, but one spirit in particular is deathly white and depicts a large bearded man who is assumed to be the Erlking (Moritz).

So Friedrich, Overbeck, and Moritz ushered in the Germanic romanticism with depictions of divine serenity, religion itself, and the mythological. There is, however, one more topic that was a major focus of European Romanticism: depictions of the past. For this the best artists to look at are Spain’s Francisco de Goya and France’s Antoine-Jean Gros.

Although the Spanish Romanticism movement only lasted from 1810-1830 is produced one of the most well known artists of the romanticism period in Francisco de Goya. Now, over the course of de Goya’s career he would go through several style changes due to secluding himself as a result from an illness that caused him to go deaf. These style changes would get more and more dark and disturbing. This change, however, produced some his best work in terms of how he depicted past events like battlefields from the Napoleonic War (Romantic). In de Goya’s set of prints The Disasters of War everything is depicted in a very morbid fashion. For example plate 30- Ravages of War shows a family that has been slaughtered in their home which has also been destroyed (Francisco). In this set de Goya also has a habit of dehumanizing everything involved, even the Spanish people. This is seen in plate 5- And they are like wild beasts where he is depicting Spanish women, the one’s he’s referring to as beasts, fighting against French soldiers in defence of themselves and their children. de Goya is using these plates to show war for what it truly is: a nightmare. Now, like de Goya, France’s Antoine-Jean Gros is known for depicting the past events of the Napoleonic War.

Just as other European countries before it, France would go through it’s own romanticism movement. This movement would last from 1815-1850 and the first major artist would come in the form of Antoine-Jean Gros. Gros, like de Goya, specialized in painting depicting the Napoleonic War. Gros, however, would glorify Napoleon rather than undermine like de Goya. For instance one of Gros’ well known works is a depiction of Napoleon and the French army in the middle of a victorious battle. This painting is called Bataille d'Aboukir, 25 Juillet 1799 which translates to Battle of Abukir, 25 July 1799 (Battle). The Battle of Abukir was a victory of the French army over the Ottoman army during the French campaign in Egypt and you can clearly see Gros’ glorification of this victory in his painting. In the painting you can see all throughout the clash of the two armies, but if you look closer you’ll notice that the Ottoman army is in retreat and the French army is pushing forward fiercely. Now, this doesn’t seem like it’s exactly glorification, until you see the main draw of the painting. When you see this piece your eyes are immediately drawn to Napoleon who is in the center of the battlefield on a large white horse (Battle). It’s almost as if he appears to be glowing which adds to the effect that Napoleon was a great French leader who commanded respect wherever he went. This would be the end of the majority of the European romanticism movement and this bring on the time of American Romanticism.

The American Romanticism movement would take place from 1820-1860 and would be dominated by the Hudson River School. The Hudson River School was a group of New York based artists that worked under the influence of Thomas Cole in order to focus on the depiction of the northeastern United States wilderness (Romanticism). This is drastically different than European Romanticism in that the artists let the landscape speak for itself rather than instilling religious beliefs, or focusing on depictions of the past and folklore. One of the best in this landscape style to come out of the Hudson River School would be Jasper Francis Cropsey. Cropsey was said to be so brilliant at depicting the northeastern autumn colors and landscapes that in London he was referred to as “America’s painter of autumn” (Southgate). All of this, the autumn colors and the allowance of nature to captivate for itself, is evident in Cropsey’s painting Eagle Cliff, Franconia Notch, New Hampshire in which he is depicting a small farming family backgrounded by a magnificent mountain range (Eagle). In Cropsey’s painting, even though there is a farming family going about their daily lives, you can immediately tell that Cropsey’s main focus was on the landscape itself. His attention to fine details and vibrant use of color instills emotions of peace and serenity. This is due to Cropsey really working to try and capture the sublimeness of the actual location that when visited by Thomas Cole caused him to say that he had been “overwhelmed with an emotion of the sublime, such as I have rarely felt . . . over all, rocks, wood, and water, brooded the spirit of repose, and the silent energy of nature stirred [my] soul to its inmost depths.” (Southgate) Cropsey wanted to make anybody who viewed his painting to be captivated and instilled with the same emotions as if they were actually there and he was able to do just that.


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