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Hudson River School Art

HUDSON RIVER SCHOOL STYLE

Considered the first major American painting movement, the Hudson River School emerged in the first half of the 19th century with landscape paintings that celebrated the young country’s natural beauty. Most of its leading painters were based in New York City where they exchanged ideas and traveled to the nearby Hudson River Valley and Catskills Mountains to re-create their vistas. At a time when the city was increasingly dense, the Hudson River School artists extolled the vast and pristine qualities of the American landscape, a sentiment that would inform the conservation movement.

American art was dominated by portraiture and historical scenes before Thomas Cole, the founder of the Hudson River School, began painting the Catskill Mountains in 1825. While the Hudson River School was informed by European art aesthetics, particularly the British focus on the sublime in nature, it was a style imbued with nationalism. The landscape painters who followed and studied under Cole would expand their focus from the Northeastern United States to places across the country, their work shared through prints and portfolios promoting an appreciation for the American wilderness — Niagara Falls, the mountain ranges that dot the American West and more — as the style blossomed during the mid-19th century.

Cole’s student Frederic Edwin Church as well as painters such as Albert Bierstadt, John Frederick Kensett, Asher Brown Durand and others became prominent proponents of the Hudson River School. The American art movement also had close ties to the literary world, including to authors like William Cullen Bryant, Henry David Thoreau and James Fenimore Cooper who wrote on similar themes. Although by the early 1900s the style had waned, and modernism would soon guide the following decades of art in the United States, the Hudson River School received renewed interest in the late 20th century for the dramatic way its artists portrayed the world.

Find a collection of authentic Hudson River School paintings, drawings and watercolors and more art on 1stDibs.

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Style: Hudson River School
Mid-19th Century Mountain Stream Oil Painting, Hudson River School
Mid-19th Century Mountain Stream Oil Painting, Hudson River School

Mid-19th Century Mountain Stream Oil Painting, Hudson River School

By Henry Boese

Located in Fredericksburg, VA

In Mountain Stream, Henry Boese presents a majestic and serene vision of the American wilderness. A crisp, rushing stream flows through the heart of the composition, cascading over r...

Category

Mid-19th Century Hudson River School Art

Materials

Oil, Board

Charles Partridge Adams Sunset Front Range Colorado Watercolor Landscape
Charles Partridge Adams Sunset Front Range Colorado Watercolor Landscape

Charles Partridge Adams Sunset Front Range Colorado Watercolor Landscape

By Charles Partridge Adams

Located in Denver, CO

A luminous early 20th-century watercolor landscape by Charles Partridge Adams depicting a dramatic Colorado sunset along the Front Range, where expansive prairie, a winding creek, an...

Category

Early 20th Century Hudson River School Art

Materials

Watercolor

Sunset Landscape, 1868
Sunset Landscape, 1868

Sunset Landscape, 1868

Located in New York, NY

F. Alexander Wust paints a stellar sunset over a hillside with light red color in his artwork entitled, “Sunset Landscape.”

Category

19th Century Hudson River School Art

Materials

Canvas, Oil

Oil Landscape of Cabin In the Mountains
Oil Landscape of Cabin In the Mountains

Oil Landscape of Cabin In the Mountains

By William Hart

Located in Fredericksburg, VA

William Hart was an influential figure in the art world, best known for his contributions as a landscape painter during the 19th century. Born in Paisley, Scotland, in 1823, Hart imm...

Category

Late 19th Century Hudson River School Art

Materials

Canvas, Oil

"Greek Ruins"

"Greek Ruins"

By Franklin D. Briscoe

Located in Lambertville, NJ

Signed Lower Right Known for his marine, history, and portrait paintings, Franklin Briscoe was born in Baltimore, Maryland and at age four moved with his family to Philadelphia where he later became a student of Edward Moran and where eventually he settled his studio. Briscoe made extended ocean voyages, including trips to Europe where he saw much painting in galleries, and from these adventures and observations developed his landmark paintings of the ocean and ships in all kinds of weather conditions. In 1885, he painted an historical mural that was in ten panels, a total of 230 feet long, and 13 feet tall--"The Battle of Gettysburg...

Category

19th Century Hudson River School Art

Materials

Canvas, Oil

Hudson River School Landscape titled "A View of the White Mountains"
Hudson River School Landscape titled "A View of the White Mountains"

Hudson River School Landscape titled "A View of the White Mountains"

By William Louis Sonntag Sr. 1

Located in Fredericksburg, VA

This finely realized landscape by William Louis Sonntag presents a serene and expansive view of the White Mountains, a region that held enduring appeal for 19th-century American arti...

Category

Late 19th Century Hudson River School Art

Materials

Canvas, Oil

Water Lilies
Water Lilies

Water Lilies

By George Henry Hall

Located in Bryn Mawr, PA

Water Lilies, 1881 Oil on canvas, 7 1/2 x 12 inches (19.1 x 30.5 cm) Framed dimensions: 16 1/8 x 21 1/8 inches Signed and dated lower left: Geo. Henry Hall '81 George Henry Hall was...

Category

1880s Hudson River School Art

Materials

Canvas, Oil

A Day in June, Scene Eastchest, New York
A Day in June, Scene Eastchest, New York

A Day in June, Scene Eastchest, New York

By Edward B. Gay

Located in Missouri, MO

"A Day in June, Scene Eastchest, New York" 1898 Edward Gay (Irish, American, 1837-1928) Oil on Canvas Complimented by original frame in great condition Signed and Dated Lower Right T...

Category

1890s Hudson River School Art

Materials

Canvas, Oil

Picking Wildflowers
Picking Wildflowers

Picking Wildflowers

By Ernest Parton

Located in Milford, NH

A fine landscape painting with birch trees and wildflowers by American artist Ernest Parton (1845-1933). Parton was born in Hudson, New York, and in his teenage years, began to accom...

Category

Early 20th Century Hudson River School Art

Materials

Canvas, Oil

Autumn Sunset Oil Painting, Hudson River School, Mid-19th Century
Autumn Sunset Oil Painting, Hudson River School, Mid-19th Century

Autumn Sunset Oil Painting, Hudson River School, Mid-19th Century

Located in Fredericksburg, VA

Paul Gottlieb Weber (1823-1916) was a German-American painter renowned for his landscape and genre scenes. Settling initially in Philadelphia from Germany, he quickly gained recognit...

Category

Mid-19th Century Hudson River School Art

Materials

Oil, Canvas

Apple Branch Botanical Still Life Sketch
Apple Branch Botanical Still Life Sketch

Apple Branch Botanical Still Life Sketch

Located in Fredericksburg, VA

A beautifully rendered 19th-century graphite study, this apple branch sketch from the notebook of Virginia Granbery captures the quiet elegance of botanical draftsmanship. The compos...

Category

19th Century Hudson River School Art

Materials

Paper, Pencil

Oil Landscape of the West on Snake River, Hudson River School
Oil Landscape of the West on Snake River, Hudson River School

Oil Landscape of the West on Snake River, Hudson River School

By Cyrenius Hall

Located in Fredericksburg, VA

Cyrenius Hall was an artist who painted Western landscapes in a luminous style. He first went to Portland, Oregon in 1853 and 1854 over the Oregon Trail. From there he executed views...

Category

Early 19th Century Hudson River School Art

Materials

Oil, Canvas

Woodland Scene
Woodland Scene

Woodland Scene

By William Bliss Baker

Located in Bryn Mawr, PA

Woodland Scene, 1885 Oil on canvas, 38 x 50 inches (96.5 x 127 cm) Framed dimensions: 49 3/8 x 61 3/8 inches Signed and dated lower left: W Bliss Baker 1885 Provenance Albert E Clue...

Category

1880s Hudson River School Art

Materials

Canvas, Oil

Landscape of Children Playing Baseball titled "Baseball Beneath the Hills"
Landscape of Children Playing Baseball titled "Baseball Beneath the Hills"

Landscape of Children Playing Baseball titled "Baseball Beneath the Hills"

By Virginia Granbery

Located in Fredericksburg, VA

This charming Hudson River School study by Virginia Granbery captures a tender and distinctly American moment: children playing baseball in a sunlit clearing. Painted by one of the f...

Category

Late 19th Century Hudson River School Art

Materials

Canvas, Oil

19th Century Oil Miniature Sailboat Landscape, Hudson River School
19th Century Oil Miniature Sailboat Landscape, Hudson River School

19th Century Oil Miniature Sailboat Landscape, Hudson River School

Located in Fredericksburg, VA

Frederick J. Sykes (1851-1905) was a remarkable artist of the Hudson River School, renowned for capturing the serene beauty of tranquil landscapes. His work often featured New Englan...

Category

Late 19th Century Hudson River School Art

Materials

Board, Oil

Rocky Shore Walk, Oil on Canvas, Hudson River School, Mid-19th Century
Rocky Shore Walk, Oil on Canvas, Hudson River School, Mid-19th Century

Rocky Shore Walk, Oil on Canvas, Hudson River School, Mid-19th Century

Located in Fredericksburg, VA

With masterful precision and a keen eye for atmosphere, Frederic Rondel captures the rugged beauty of the coastline in Walking Along a Rocky Shore. The painting depicts a windswept s...

Category

Mid-19th Century Hudson River School Art

Materials

Oil, Canvas

Charles River Meadows, MA
Charles River Meadows, MA

Charles River Meadows, MA

Located in Fredericksburg, VA

"Charles River Meadows, Massachusetts" by Mark E. Slayton is a masterful landscape painting that embodies the beauty characteristic of the Hudson River School. As a prominent artist ...

Category

Mid-19th Century Hudson River School Art

Materials

Canvas, Oil

Waterfalls of Hot Springs, VA
Waterfalls of Hot Springs, VA

Waterfalls of Hot Springs, VA

By William Guy Wall

Located in Fredericksburg, VA

This richly detailed Hudson River School painting by William Guy Wall presents a striking view of a waterfall near Hot Springs, Virginia. Painted with warm, earthy tones and a glowin...

Category

Mid-19th Century Hudson River School Art

Materials

Canvas, Oil

Autumn Landscape
Autumn Landscape

Autumn Landscape

By William Louis Sonntag Sr. 1

Located in Milford, NH

A wonderful Autumn landscape likely of the Hudson River Valley by the revered American artist William Louis Sonntag (1822-1900). Sonntag was born near Pittsburgh, PA and moved to Cincinnati, OH in the 1840’s to study art. He studied for a brief time with G. Frankenstein at the Cincinnati Academy of Fine Art and his idealized paintings of American wilderness and visionary paintings of imagined European ruins were commercially successful. He traveled twice to Europe in the 1850’s to improve his skills, eventually settling in New York City. He joined the National Academy of Design, where he exhibited his works for forty years. His mature works identify him with the Hudson River School of landscape painters. A romantic and naturalistic painter of his surroundings, Sonntag also created idealized paintings of Roman ruins, recalling his European trips of earlier years. Sonntag was an Associate (1860) and Academician (1861) at the National Academy of Design, and a member of the American Watercolor Society, Artists Fund Society, and the American Art Union...

Category

19th Century Hudson River School Art

Materials

Canvas, Oil

"Grand Manan" Harrison Bird Brown, Maine Landscape, Hudson River School Seascape
"Grand Manan" Harrison Bird Brown, Maine Landscape, Hudson River School Seascape

"Grand Manan" Harrison Bird Brown, Maine Landscape, Hudson River School Seascape

By Harrison Bird Brown

Located in New York, NY

Harrison Bird Brown (1831 - 1915) Grand Manan Oil on canvas 12 x 20 inches Signed with initials lower left Harrison Bird Brown was born in 1831 in Portland, Maine, and is best known for his White Mountain landscapes and marine paintings of Maine's Casco Bay...

Category

Late 19th Century Hudson River School Art

Materials

Canvas, Oil

Portrait of Man with Shovel
Portrait of Man with Shovel

Portrait of Man with Shovel

Located in Fredericksburg, VA

This painting depicts a man standing confidently with a shovel. This is an American School, likely Hudson River School drawing from the 1860s or 1870s. This 19th century unsigned painting...

Category

Mid-19th Century Hudson River School Art

Materials

Paper, Graphite

Portrait of Young Woman Sewing in a Rocking Chair
Portrait of Young Woman Sewing in a Rocking Chair

Portrait of Young Woman Sewing in a Rocking Chair

Located in Fredericksburg, VA

"Young Lady Sewing on Rocking Chair" by an 1860s American School artist is a charming watercolor painting that captures a traditionally domestic moment...

Category

Mid-19th Century Hudson River School Art

Materials

Paper, Watercolor

"Ship Portrait, " William Edward Norton, Seascape Maritime Painting, New England
"Ship Portrait, " William Edward Norton, Seascape Maritime Painting, New England

"Ship Portrait, " William Edward Norton, Seascape Maritime Painting, New England

By William Edward Norton

Located in New York, NY

William Edward Norton (1843 - 1916) Ship Portrait, 1876 Oil on canvas 10 x 16 inches Signed and dated lower left Born in Boston, William Norton became a noted marine painter, stirred by his youth when he sailed on family-owned ships. He studied at the Lowell Institute in Boston, and with George Inness, and then established a studio in Boston. In the early 1870s, he went to Paris and became a student with Chevreuse and A. Vollon, and then he settled in London where he exhibited throughout the last quarter of the 19th century. His reputation there was based on his scenes of the Thames River, and ocean and coastal views. In 1901, he and his wife returned to the United States and settled in New York City. He also painted at Monhegan Island, Maine, where a treacherous ledge on the southern side of the island is named "Norton's Ledge" for him. He was a member of the Boston Art Club with whom he exhibited from 1873 to 1909. He also exhibited with the Pennsylvania Academy, the Royal Academy in London, the Paris Salon, the 1893 Chicago Exposition...

Category

1870s Hudson River School Art

Materials

Canvas, Oil

Little Girl Reading by House
Little Girl Reading by House

Little Girl Reading by House

By Edward Lamson Henry

Located in Fredericksburg, VA

"Reading After School," attributed to Edward Lamson Henry, offers a glimpse into the everyday moments of 19th-century American life. Known for his meticulous detail and his ability t...

Category

Late 19th Century Hudson River School Art

Materials

Oil, Board

A Friend of a Friend (oil painting of young boys in landscape)
A Friend of a Friend (oil painting of young boys in landscape)

A Friend of a Friend (oil painting of young boys in landscape)

Located in Fredericksburg, VA

Richard Law Hinsdale (1832–1874) was an American painter known for his contributions to landscape and genre painting during the mid-19th century, mostly in the Hudson River School. He received brief instruction from Alexander Emmons, Philip Hewins and Jared B Flagg as well as being exhibited in American art...

Category

Mid-19th Century Hudson River School Art

Materials

Canvas, Oil

Distant Horizon
Distant Horizon

Distant Horizon

By Edward Moran

Located in Saratoga Springs, NY

Edward Moran (American, 1829 - 1901) Boy with Dog on Dock Oil on canvas Signed lower left 22 x 36 inches Provenance: Sotheby's Sale no. 3255 Oct. 27-28, 1977 Page 58 Price on reques...

Category

Late 19th Century Hudson River School Art

Materials

Canvas, Oil

View of South Pond, New York, 1879 by Ida H. Stebbins (American, b. 1851)
View of South Pond, New York, 1879 by Ida H. Stebbins (American, b. 1851)

View of South Pond, New York, 1879 by Ida H. Stebbins (American, b. 1851)

Located in New York, NY

Painted by Hudson River School artist Ida H. Stebbins (b. 1851), "View of South Pond, New York," 1879 is oil on canvas, measures 23 x 33 1/2 inches, and is signed and dated 1879 at the lower left. The work is framed in an elegant Barbizon style frame and ready to hang. Ida H. Stebbins was born in January 1851 in Chelsea, Massachusetts to Mary and Isaac Stebbins, a teacher. Though scant records remain of Stebbins’ artistic training or career, various personal details of her life have been gleaned from contemporary newspapers and federal documents. By the time View of South Pond, New York was painted in 1879, she was living in Boston. Like many artists of her generation, Stebbins likely traveled throughout the Northeast region, gaining inspiration for her paintings from the landscape of New England and New York. Stebbins was likely visiting upstate New York when she painted this sweeping view of South Pond and the surrounding mountains near Long Lake in the Adirondacks just south of Deerland. Here, Stebbins captures the stunning vermillion, burnt orange and brown tones of the autumn landscape with the style and precise rendering often seen in paintings produced by the Hudson River School. Shortly after the completion of View of South Pond, New York, Stebbins married Frank H. Slack, a clerk, in her hometown of Chelsea on December 14, 1881 at the age of thirty. The couple moved to Hotel Comfort in Boston, where their son, Roland Stewart Slack was born on May 22, 1883. It seems likely that her husband died in the mid-1880s since on December 3, 1889, records indicate that Ida and Roland changed their last name back to her maiden name of Stebbins. Roland Stewart Stebbins (1883-1974) inherited his mother’s interest in art, studying at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Columbia University in New York, and the Art Students League of New York. He also studied at the Académie de la Grand Chaumière and the Munich Academy of Fine Arts. Today, he is remembered for his marine and genre paintings and for his legacy as a respected professor of art education at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. On January 1, 1890, Ida married her second husband, Timothy Jarvis, in Somerville, Massachusetts. Their daughter, Ida Hazel Jarvis, was born soon after in 1893. However, the child suffered paralysis from a brain tumor...

Category

19th Century Hudson River School Art

Materials

Canvas, Oil

American School Long Island Sunset Beach Scene Seascape Framed Original Painting
American School Long Island Sunset Beach Scene Seascape Framed Original Painting

American School Long Island Sunset Beach Scene Seascape Framed Original Painting

Located in Buffalo, NY

Antique American seascape sunset oil painting. Oil on canvas, lain to masonite. Framed. Measuring: 17 by 26 inches overall, 10 and 20 by painting alone. Unsigned. Excellent conditi...

Category

1920s Hudson River School Art

Materials

Oil

Resting Beneath the Trees by the Stream
Resting Beneath the Trees by the Stream

Resting Beneath the Trees by the Stream

Located in Fredericksburg, VA

George Owen's "Resting Beneath the Trees by the Stream" is a quintessential Hudson River School painting that encapsulates the majesty and sublime beauty of the American landscape. T...

Category

Mid-19th Century Hudson River School Art

Materials

Canvas, Oil

High Bridge and Croton Waterworks (Harlem River)
High Bridge and Croton Waterworks (Harlem River)

High Bridge and Croton Waterworks (Harlem River)

Located in Wilton Manors, FL

Stunning Hudson River School landscape by George Lafayette Clough (1824-1901). High Bridge and Croton Waterworks, Harlem River, ca. 1870. Oil on canvas measures 14 x 21 inches; 26 x 33 inches in original frame. Signed lower left. Old repair of small diagonal puncture measuring 1/2 inch in length to the right of ship sail. Otherwise no damage or conservation to painting. Original frame has several areas of damage and loss and will require conservation. George Lafayette Clough was born September 18, 1824, in Auburn, New York, and was that city's leading landscapist and, known as a Hudson River School painter, became Auburn's most noted resident painter of the mid-century. His mother was widowed shortly after his birth, and he was raised without paternal influence. He had little formal education and was employed by the age of ten. By age fifteen he had taken up painting, and his first and informal art influence came from the portraitist, Randall Palmer. In 1844 Clough opened his own studio in Auburn. About that time Charles Loring Elliott...

Category

19th Century Hudson River School Art

Materials

Oil

Niagara Falls 1870s Large Panoramic Oil Painting New York State And Ontario
Niagara Falls 1870s Large Panoramic Oil Painting New York State And Ontario

Niagara Falls 1870s Large Panoramic Oil Painting New York State And Ontario

Located in Sutton Poyntz, Dorset

Alexandre Le Bihan. French ( b.1839 - d.1924 ). Niagara Falls. Oil On Canvas. Signed Lower Left. Image size 23.2 inches x 49.2 inches ( 59cm x 125cm ). Frame size 28.9 inches x 55.1...

Category

Late 19th Century Hudson River School Art

Materials

Canvas, Oil

Fishing on the Cliffs, Oil on Board, Hudson River School, 19th Century

Fishing on the Cliffs, Oil on Board, Hudson River School, 19th Century

Located in Fredericksburg, VA

M. A. Stone’s A Day of Fishing on the Cliffs, painted in the mid nineteenth century, is a striking and beautifully composed coastal landscape that captures both the grandeur of natur...

Category

Mid-19th Century Hudson River School Art

Materials

Board, Oil

"Outskirt Village Near Tangier, North Africa"
"Outskirt Village Near Tangier, North Africa"

"Outskirt Village Near Tangier, North Africa"

By Hermann Ottomar Herzog

Located in San Francisco, CA

Both romantic and realistic, this timeless work by Herman Herzog was painted more than a century ago near Morocco’s Atlantic coast city of Tangiers, a sentinel to the Strait of Gibra...

Category

Early 20th Century Hudson River School Art

Materials

Canvas, Oil

Raspberries, Peonies with a Basket
Raspberries, Peonies with a Basket

Raspberries, Peonies with a Basket

By George Henry Hall

Located in Saratoga Springs, NY

George Henry Hall (1825–1913) "Raspberries & Peonies with Basket" Signed lower right and dated 1862 & 63 Oil on board Sight size: 10.5 × 13.75 in. Frame size: 19 x 22 in. Frame: P...

Category

1860s Hudson River School Art

Materials

Oil, Board

Road-Side View (View in Wisconsin)
Road-Side View (View in Wisconsin)

Road-Side View (View in Wisconsin)

By Seth Eastman

Located in New York, NY

Label on stretcher bar: No. 175. / AMERICAN ART-UNION. /Road-Side View / Painted by / Seth Eastman / Distributed December 20, 1850.

Category

19th Century Hudson River School Art

Materials

Oil

“Worcester, Massachusetts”
“Worcester, Massachusetts”

“Worcester, Massachusetts”

Located in Southampton, NY

Oil on wood panel painting of a Worcester, Massachusetts view by local resident artist Mabel Blake. Signed M. Blake lower left. Circa 1880. Condition is good. The bucolic scene depicts a man in a boat...

Category

1880s Hudson River School Art

Materials

Oil, Board

“Seaside Cliffs, California”
“Seaside Cliffs, California”

“Seaside Cliffs, California”

By George Douglas Brewerton

Located in Southampton, NY

Beautiful original pastel on archival card stock from Paris of the craggy seaside cliffs of California by the well known Hudson River artist, George Douglas Bremerton. Signed lower left. Circa 1880. Condition is excellent. Under glass. The artwork is housed in its original ornate scroll designed frame. Overall framed measurements are 33 by 19 inches. Provenance: A East Coast Florida estate. George Douglas Brewerton received lessons in art from Prof. Robert W. Weir at West Point where his father was Superintendent. In 1874, he was detailed to San Francisco as an officer in the Stevenson Regiment. In 1848, he underwent many adventures in Western deserts and mountains with Kit Carson, who crossed the country with news of the California Gold Rush. After serving as an aide to Gen. Rufus Saxton during the Civil War, Brewerton called himself “Colonel,” although he never received an army commission...

Category

1870s Hudson River School Art

Materials

Pastel, Archival Paper

"Building the Allegheny Railroad, Pennsylvania" Alfred Wall, Scalp Level School
"Building the Allegheny Railroad, Pennsylvania" Alfred Wall, Scalp Level School

"Building the Allegheny Railroad, Pennsylvania" Alfred Wall, Scalp Level School

Located in New York, NY

Alfred S. Wall (American, 1825-1896) Untitled (Building the Railroad), 1859 Oil on canvas 14 1/2 x 18 1/2 inches Signed and dated lower left For Christmas, 2008, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette featured Alfred Wall's painting, Old Saw Mill from the collection of the Westmoreland Museum of American Art in Greensburg, PA. It was painted in 1851 in the town of Lilly, Pennsylvania in the Allegheny Mountains. The newspaper description stated that "though the saw mill is long gone, it still conveys all the warmth and coziness of this time of year. The article, written by Patricia Lowry, continued: At first glance, Alfred S. Wall's painting of a saw mill in snowy woods triggers nostalgia for the coziness of a log cabin, the smell of a wood-burning fire and the warming of chilled hands and feet beside it. But as sentimental as it seems on the surface, Mr. Wall's painting has a deeper and unexpected context. This is more than a painting about sled-riding children and early industry planted in the middle of virgin forest. Intended or not, this is a painting about conquering the great divide of the Allegheny Mountains. For the third consecutive year, the Post-Gazette features a winter-scene painting on the cover of the Christmas Day newspaper. This year's painting, Old Saw Mill, was selected by co-publisher and editor-in-chief John Robinson Block and executive editor David Shribman during a visit to the Westmoreland Museum of American Art in Greensburg. Mr. Wall, listed as a portrait painter in the 1850 census, was about 26 when he painted Old Saw Mill in 1851. The self-taught artist was born in Mount Pleasant, Westmoreland County, to William and Lucy Wall, who'd emigrated from England around 1820. An artistic sensibility ran in the family: William was a sculptor who carved ornate tombstones here; Alfred's children, A. Bryan and Bessie, were landscape painters, as was Alfred's older brother, William Coventry Wall. For more than a century the Walls formed a prominent art dynasty in Pittsburgh, and Alfred, eventually a partner in the city's most prestigious art gallery, was well known as a painter, dealer and restorer. In Old Saw Mill, two wood cutters, each holding an axe, meet outside the mill; one points in the direction of the forest. On the other side of the stream, one child pulls another down the hillside on a sled. Just behind the hill's slope, the roof of a building appears, perhaps the home of the sawyer. The luminous, late afternoon light comes from the northwest, casting lengthening shadows on the snow under a darkening sky. The saw mill in "Old Saw Mill" likely would have been impossible to track down had Mr. Wall, presumably, not written on the back of the painting: "old saw mill near Jct. 4, Portage RR, Pa." "There was no Junction 4," said Mike Garcia, park ranger at the Allegheny Portage Railroad National Historic Site, about 90 miles east of Pittsburgh near Gallitzen, Cambria County. "But there was an Inclined Plane No. 4 at Lilly, and there was a saw mill there." In fact, there were at least six saw mills at Lilly over the years, said longtime resident Jim Salony, president of the Lilly-Washington Historical Society. But when he saw an image of the painting, Mr. Salony had no trouble coming up with a location. While there are no known photographs of the saw mill, he believes it stood near the intersection of Portage and Washington streets, next to Bear Rock Run. Mr. Salony, retired academic dean at Mount Aloysius College, didn't know exactly when the mill was torn down, but it's been gone since at least the late 1800s. He was pleased to learn of the painting, even though that knowledge came too late for inclusion in a new book about Lilly, The Spirit of a Community, for which he served as primary author and editor. It runs to more than 700 pages. For a little town -- population 869 last year -- Lilly has a lot of history. Nestled in a bowl on the western slope of the Allegheny Mountains about 3 miles south of Cresson, Lilly was first settled in 1806 by Joseph Meyer and his family, who named their 332-acre land patent Dundee. Although the Meyers had left by 1811, other settlers followed, but the community didn't flourish until the 1830s, when the Allegheny Portage Railroad began its 23-year-run through the town. For 200 years the Alleghenies had stood as an impediment to trade and travel between Pittsburgh and the east. A canal from Philadelphia to Pittsburgh would change that and compete with New York's Erie Canal. But a portage railroad would have to be built, on which teams of horses would lead the canal boats over the mountains. Engineer Sylvester Welch began his surveying from the small settlement at Lilly. The railroad would require 10 inclined planes, some quite steep, between Hollidaysburg and Johnstown. To build it, trees had to be cut along a 120-foot-wide right-of-way for 36 miles, along which track and engine houses had to be built. William Brown, who owned the saw mill on Bear Rock Run, built at least one of the engine houses at Inclined Plane No. 4; an 1834 contract also included fencing the dwelling lots at the head and foot of the plane. Lilly is located at what was the foot of Inclined Plane No. 4., giving the community one of its early informal names, Foot of Four. Named in 1883 for Richard Lilly, who'd completed the grist mill there, Lilly had another early name: Hemlock, so dubbed by a Portage Railroad traveler who smelled the bark stripped from the trees at the saw mill. Because there isn't another Allegheny Portage Railroad location like it, where a cut in the mountains opens into a bowl, Mr. Salony thinks it was Lilly that Charles Dickens wrote about following his trip from Harrisburg to Pittsburgh on the Pennsylvania Canal in late March 1842, describing what he saw after emerging from "the bottom of the cut": "It was very pretty while traveling, to look down into a valley full of light and softness, catching glimpses through the tree-tops of scattered cabins; children running to the doors; dogs bursting out to bark, who we could see without hearing; terrified pigs scampering homeward; families sitting out in their rude gardens; cows gazing upward with a stupid indifference; men in their shirt-sleeves looking on at their unfinished houses, planning out to-morrow's work; and we riding onward, high above them, like a whirlwind." To get to Lilly, Mr. Wall may have taken the Pennsylvania Canal from his home in Allegheny City, now the North Side. He'd married young, at 21, to Sarah Carr in 1846, the same year he began his career as an artist. By 1880 they were living in a brick townhouse at 104 (later 814) Arch St., now demolished. Across the river in Pittsburgh he shared a studio at 67 Fourth Ave. with his brother William; they later moved to Burke's Building, today the city's oldest office building at 209-211 Fourth. But often they worked outdoors, sometimes as part of the colony of artists that grew up around painter George Hetzel beginning in the late 1860s at Scalp Level...

Category

1850s Hudson River School Art

Materials

Canvas, Oil

"Passing Shower" Oil Painting, Hudson River School, Late 19th Century
"Passing Shower" Oil Painting, Hudson River School, Late 19th Century

"Passing Shower" Oil Painting, Hudson River School, Late 19th Century

Located in Fredericksburg, VA

George Smillie (1840-1921) was an American landscape painter renowned for his serene and meticulously detailed depictions of the natural world. Smillie’s work is characterized by its...

Category

Late 19th Century Hudson River School Art

Materials

Oil, Canvas

“View of Mount Shasta, California”
“View of Mount Shasta, California”

“View of Mount Shasta, California”

By George Douglas Brewerton

Located in Southampton, NY

Beautiful original pastel on archival paper of Mount Shasta in Northern California by the well known Hudson River artist, George Douglas. Signed and dated 1874 lower right. Condition is excellent. Recently professionally matted and framed in a antique silver style gallery frame. Overall framed measurements are 27 by 36 inches. Under glass. Provenance: A Pennsylvania collector. George Douglas Brewerton received lessons in art from Prof. Robert W. Weir at West Point where his father was Superintendent. In 1874, he was detailed to San Francisco as an officer in the Stevenson Regiment. In 1848, he underwent many adventures in Western deserts and mountains with Kit Carson, who crossed the country with news of the California Gold Rush. After serving as an aide to Gen. Rufus Saxton during the Civil War, Brewerton called himself “Colonel,” although he never received an army commission...

Category

1870s Hudson River School Art

Materials

Pastel, Archival Paper

Hudson River School art for sale on 1stDibs.

Find a wide variety of authentic Hudson River School art available for sale on 1stDibs. Works in this style were very popular during the 21st Century and Contemporary, but contemporary artists have continued to produce works inspired by this movement. If you’re looking to add art created in this style to introduce contrast in an otherwise neutral space in your home, the works available on 1stDibs include elements of blue, orange, purple and other colors. Many Pop art paintings were created by popular artists on 1stDibs, including Ralph Albert Blakelock, Jane Bloodgood-Abrams, Jasper Francis Cropsey, and John Frederick Kensett. Frequently made by artists working with Paint, and Oil Paint and other materials, all of these pieces for sale are unique and have attracted attention over the years. Not every interior allows for large Hudson River School art, so small editions measuring 2 inches across are also available. Prices for art made by famous or emerging artists can differ depending on medium, time period and other attributes. On 1stDibs, the price for these items starts at $400 and tops out at $875,000, while the average work sells for $13,267.