1801 -1848 · Catskills and birth of the American landscape

Sublime valleys, ruined empires and allegorical journeys make Thomas Cole the visionary founder of the Hudson River School.

Thomas Cole was born in 1801 in Bolton-le-Moors, Lancashire, and died in 1848 in Catskill, New York. Emigrating to the United States with his family in 1818, he first learned engraving and then trained almost alone in landscape. His views of the Catskills quickly met with the support of New York artists and collectors. Cole did not just describe nature: he wanted to elevate the landscape to the rank of history painting and give it moral significance. His travels to England and Italy between 1829 and 1832 brought him into contact with Turner, Constable, Claude Lorrain, ancient ruins and the Roman countryside. His travels to England and Italy between 1829 and 1832 brought him into contact with Turner, Constable, Claude Lorrain, ancient ruins and the Roman countryside. Cole did not just describe nature: he wanted to elevate the landscape to the rank of history painting and give it moral significance. His travels to England and Italy between 1829 and 1832 brought him into contact with Turner, Constable, Claude Lorrain, ancient ruins and the Roman countryside. His travels to England and Italy between 1829 and 1832 brought him into contact with Turner, Constable, Claude Lorrain, ancient ruins and the Roman countryside. His travels to England and Italy between 1829 and Course of the Empire, five paintings that lead a civilization from the wild to destruction and then desolation. In The Connecticut Loop, known as The Oxbow, the storm, the forest and the cultivated lands oppose sublime nature and human expansion; the painter imagines himself tiny in the center of the panorama. The architect's Dream transforms the history of styles into an imaginary city, while The Journey of Life follows existence from childhood to old age. Through his teaching and example, Cole influences Asher B. Durand and Frederic Edwin Church. His painting thus unites American observation, European memory, early ecology and spiritual narrative. The "Thomas Cole" selection notably compares The Course of Empire: Destruction and The Connecticut Loop (The Oxbow). His reading favors color.

Cole makes the landscape a consciousness: the valley, the ruin and the storm together question the destiny of a civilization.