Although they had vastly different approaches, George Inness (1825–1894) and James Abbott McNeill Whistler (1834–1903) are seen as the forefathers of Tonalism. Subsequent artists practicing the style found inspiration in one or the other, or both.

George Inness became one of the most important landscape painters in the United States after the Civil War. His early work bore similarities to that of the artists of the Hudson River School in its tight paint handling and detail, but his subject matter differed in that he favored domesticated views rather than the awe-inspiring wilderness depicted by America’s first group of landscape artists. In his travels abroad, Inness was exposed to the work of the French Barbizon painters, realist artists who depicted rural subjects with loose brushstrokes and a deep, rich palette. Drawing on this, Inness developed a personal style that eschewed the narrative elements often found in Barbizon work. He gradually relied more upon memory, woven with his belief in the relationship between natural and spiritual worlds.

If George Inness was the most important late nineteenth-century American landscape painter, James Abbott McNeill Whistler was overall one of the most influential artists of the century. Unlike Inness’s efforts to realize spirituality in his landscapes, Whistler espoused Aestheticism, or “Art for Art’s Sake.” He stated,

Art should be independent of all clap-trap—should stand alone, and appeal to the artistic sense of eye or ear, without confounding this with emotions entirely foreign to it, as devotion, pity, love, patriotism, and the like. All these have no kind of concern with it, and that is why I insist on calling my works “arrangements” and “harmonies” (Endnote 1).

Aestheticism encouraged artists to move away from traditional representation and subject matter. This departure from the depiction of visual reality set the stage for the rise of modernist approaches, including abstraction, in the twentieth century.

Whistler also immersed himself in the avant-garde artistic and literary circles in Paris and London whose members believed that contemporary life should be the source of creative work. In the visual arts, this radical concept rejected the Renaissance tradition of historical painting—subjects taken from ancient Greek and Roman history or the Bible—long held to be the highest form of expression. In all media—painting, pastel, etching, and other works on paper—Whistler also embraced the principles of Japanese composition, then newly discovered by European artists via prints, with flattened forms and space, and often monochromatic colors.

Endnotes:

1. James McNeill Whistler to The World, May 22, 1878, in University of Glasgow, The Correspondence of James McNeill Whistler, https://www.whistler.arts.gla.ac.uk/correspondence/exhibit/display/?rs=…, accessed 7/24/19

Like those of George Inness, the early landscape paintings of other artists who became Tonalists also revealed affinities with the Hudson River School. Homer Dodge Martin (1836–1897), Jervis McEntee (1828–1891), and Alexander Helwig Wyant, for example, all matured as painters when the Hudson River School was in its prime. Martin and McEntee studied with artists associated with the school, and Wyant was inspired to become a landscapist after seeing some of Inness’s work in an exhibition. While their early paintings employed detailed brushstrokes and frequently featured open vistas in full daylight, their later compositions became looser in paint handling, with evocative, more intimate glimpses of nature in subdued light. McEntee, not traditionally associated with Tonalism, made his intentions clear: “All art is based upon a knowledge of Nature and a sympathy for her; but in order to represent her it is not necessary to make a thing exactly like a thing. Imitation is not what we want, but suggestion…” (Endnote 2)

A later generation of artists, and the largest group in this exhibition, worked solely in a Tonalist style. Some studied with Inness or sought out Whistler, others saw their work in exhibitions or were influenced by those already immersed in the style, as it was one that prevailed at the end of the nineteenth century. Just a sample in this exhibition includes the softly glowing evening scenes of Carl Eric Lindin (1869–1942), the muted colors of the rocky hillsides favored by Ben Foster (1852–1926), and the sun filtered through milky skies in landscapes by Leonard Ochtman (1854–1934).  

Other painters explored more than Tonalism. Walter Launt Palmer, for example, moved back and forth between Impressionism, characterized by short brushstrokes, pure colors, and scenes depicted in direct sunlight, and the subtler range of color and moodiness of Tonalism, demonstrating that the two approaches were not mutually exclusive. Agnes Richmond (1870–1964) began her career working in a rich Tonalist mode but became better known for her more brightly lit portraits painted with saturated colors.

Tonalism has often been discussed as old-fashioned rather than avant-garde, and its reputation plummeted in the twentieth century. In fact, in a mid-century survey of American painting the author wrote that “this movement is today completely forgotten.” (Endnote 3) Some of this may have to do with the dark, sometimes murky palette, the focus on mundane (though often beautiful) subject matter, and the retreat from depicting the contemporary world. Much about Tonalism, however, looks forward to Modernism and the subtle exploration of color relationships not bound by representation with which artists experimented in the twentieth century, sometimes leading to total abstraction. This is seen, for example, in the increasingly ethereal work of John Francis Murphy (1853–1921), in the thickly painted surfaces of the canvases of Charles Melville Dewey (1849–1937) that vie with the subject, or the opposite, in the thinly applied pigments that cast a veil over the landscapes of Leon Dabo (c. 1864–1960).

Endnotes:

2. Jervis McEntee in George William Sheldon, American Painters: With Eighty-three Examples of Their Work Engraved on Wood, London: Cassel Petter & Galpin; New York: D. Applewood and Company, 1879, pp. 51-52 as quoted in Lee A. Vedder, “Jervis McEntee: Painter-Poet of the Hudson River School,” in Jervis McEntee: Painter-Poet of the Hudson River School, Samuel Dorsky Museum of Art, State University of New York at New Paltz, 2015, p. 13.

3. E. P. Richardson, Painting in America: The Story of 450 Years, Thomas Y. Crowell Company, New York, 1956, p. 368, n. 5.

Like those of George Inness, the early landscape paintings of other artists who became Tonalists also revealed affinities with the Hudson River School. Homer Dodge Martin (1836–1897), Jervis McEntee (1828–1891), and Alexander Helwig Wyant, for example, all matured as painters when the Hudson River School was in its prime. Martin and McEntee studied with artists associated with the school, and Wyant was inspired to become a landscapist after seeing some of Inness’s work in an exhibition. While their early paintings employed detailed brushstrokes and frequently featured open vistas in full daylight, their later compositions became looser in paint handling, with evocative, more intimate glimpses of nature in subdued light. McEntee, not traditionally associated with Tonalism, made his intentions clear: “All art is based upon a knowledge of Nature and a sympathy for her; but in order to represent her it is not necessary to make a thing exactly like a thing. Imitation is not what we want, but suggestion…” (Endnote 2)

A later generation of artists, and the largest group in this exhibition, worked solely in a Tonalist style. Some studied with Inness or sought out Whistler, others saw their work in exhibitions or were influenced by those already immersed in the style, as it was one that prevailed at the end of the nineteenth century. Just a sample in this exhibition includes the softly glowing evening scenes of Carl Eric Lindin (1869–1942), the muted colors of the rocky hillsides favored by Ben Foster (1852–1926), and the sun filtered through milky skies in landscapes by Leonard Ochtman (1854–1934).  

Other painters explored more than Tonalism. Walter Launt Palmer, for example, moved back and forth between Impressionism, characterized by short brushstrokes, pure colors, and scenes depicted in direct sunlight, and the subtler range of color and moodiness of Tonalism, demonstrating that the two approaches were not mutually exclusive. Agnes Richmond (1870–1964) began her career working in a rich Tonalist mode but became better known for her more brightly lit portraits painted with saturated colors.

Tonalism has often been discussed as old-fashioned rather than avant-garde, and its reputation plummeted in the twentieth century. In fact, in a mid-century survey of American painting the author wrote that “this movement is today completely forgotten.” (Endnote 3) Some of this may have to do with the dark, sometimes murky palette, the focus on mundane (though often beautiful) subject matter, and the retreat from depicting the contemporary world. Much about Tonalism, however, looks forward to Modernism and the subtle exploration of color relationships not bound by representation with which artists experimented in the twentieth century, sometimes leading to total abstraction. This is seen, for example, in the increasingly ethereal work of John Francis Murphy (1853–1921), in the thickly painted surfaces of the canvases of Charles Melville Dewey (1849–1937) that vie with the subject, or the opposite, in the thinly applied pigments that cast a veil over the landscapes of Leon Dabo (c. 1864–1960).
 

Tonalism was not confined to oil painting. As seen in this exhibition, artists also worked in pastels, watercolors, printmaking, and photography, and the style reached across all media. The soft quality of pastels was conducive to subtle Tonalist effects in the work of Dwight William Tryon (1849–1925) or Walter Launt Palmer, for example. Charles Warren Eaton (1857–1937) explored the delicate washes of watercolor. The etchings of Margery Ryerson (1886–1989) relate to those of Whistler in the suggestive play between dark ink and light paper. Bolton Brown, who became known as the father of American lithography for his experiments in that medium, produced a body of work that includes evocative landscapes of subdued tonal ranges. Likewise, the soft-focus approach in photography, called Pictorialism, explored similar principles, as seen in moody images by Horatio Hendrickson (c.1866–1941) or George Seeley (1880–1955), among others.

By 1915, Bolton Brown, a co-founder of Byrdcliffe, was immersed in lithography, a printmaking process using a stone plate. Although the process was invented at the end of the 18th century in Germany and used commercially and artistically throughout Europe and the United States in the 19th century, Brown is credited as the father of American lithography for his dedication to perfecting the medium scientifcally and artistically. He experimented with and invented new processes, wrote on the subject, printed for other artists, and had an output of over 400 lithographs. His own work ranges in style and subject matter, exploiting the expressive possibilities of the process— from delicate, tonal landscapes to sharply delineated still lifes.

Although a wide range of artistic approaches in Woodstock continued in the 1930s, economic and social issues became more prevalent as subject matter with the onset of the Depression. Realism dominated much of the work, sometimes tinged with modernist elements, including abstraction. Various New Deal government programs—the Public Works of Art Project (1933–1934) and the Federal Art Project under the Works Progress Administration (1935–1943)—helped many Woodstock artists at this time. Some were commissioned to execute murals, others to produce prints, easel paintings, sculpture, posters, crafts, and more.

After World War II a new generation of artists arrived in Woodstock, joining those already established there. Along with the continued success of the earlier institutions, the return of the Art Students League Summer School (1947–1979) and annual events such as the Woodstock Art Conference (1947–1952) ensured the enduring vitality of the colony into the late 20th century to today.

In 1920, at the invitation of Eugene Speicher, George Bellows spent his frst summer in Woodstock. Bellows belonged to the Ashcan School, a loosely associated group of early 20th-century artists working in New York City who favored urban subjects, often gritty in nature. They painted in a realist style that was in contrast to the prevailing and popular academic approaches. Both Speicher and Bellows had studied with its leader, Robert Henri, in New York.

Bellows became in many respects the backbone of Arthur Anderson’s collection and is richly represented by over 150 works, the most of any artist. His circle of artist friends in Woodstock included Speicher and Henri, as well as Leon Kroll, John Carroll, and Charles Rosen, among others.

In 1902 the Byrdcliffe Arts Colony was established in Woodstock. The year-round utopian community promoted the Arts and Crafts movement, which emphasized individual, hand-crafted work over mass production. Wealthy Englishman Ralph Radcliffe Whitehead and his wife, Jane Byrd McCall, along with writer Hervey White and artist Bolton Brown, founded the colony; its name was derived from the middle names of the Whiteheads, who financed the project.

Byrdcliffe drew artisans from across all media: furniture makers, painters, printmakers, photographers, metalworkers, weavers, ceramicists, and others, as well as writers and musicians. Classes were offered, and notable teachers included co-founder Bolton Brown, Hermann Dudley Murphy, Birge Harrison, and William Schumacher. Byrdcliffe continues to flourish today under the auspices of the Woodstock Byrdcliffe Guild.

Hervey White left Byrdcliffe in 1904 and purchased a nearby farm to establish what would become the Maverick Arts Colony, a community more bohemian than Byrdcliffe. Early on, the colony attracted mostly writers and musicians, though by the 1920s visual artists of wideranging approaches had a large presence too. In 1910 White launched the Maverick Press, which published original literary and artistic material. A theater and concert hall also graced the grounds.

In 1915 White staged the first Maverick Festival, which would provide the main economic support for the colony. Held annually on the night of the August full moon, the festival featured music, dancing, food and drink, and attendees dressed in creative costumes. It is often seen as the forerunner to the famous Woodstock Music and Art Fair that was held in Bethel, New York, in 1969. Every summer Maverick Concerts still take place in the concert hall built by Hervey White in 1916.

Frank C. Eckmair (1930-2012) lived most of his life in central New York. He spent his early years drawing and working at his father’s hotel in Gilbertsville, a small village in Otsego County, west of Cooperstown. He earned a Bachelor of Arts degree from the State University of Iowa, where he studied with Mauricio Lasansky, who is considered to be the “Father of 20th-Century American Printmaking.” After teaching public school, Eckmair served in the U.S. Air Force in Korea, Japan, and the northwestern United States. He then received a Master of Fine Arts in printmaking from Ohio University. From 1963 to 1995 he was a revered teacher at Buffalo State College, where he influenced a generation of artists.

His work received its earliest recognition through American Associated Artists (AAA), a program founded to market affordable fine art prints to the American public. Like earlier artists such as Grant Wood, John Steuart Curry, and Thomas Hart Benton, Eckmair created prints of regional landscapes for AAA that had great populist appeal. He was also the artistic director of Birch Book Press, a publisher of hand-crafted letterpress books and art. Considered a master of the woodcut and represented in major collections around the world, Eckmair created haunting works evoking rural life in upstate New York.

In 1906 the Art Students League moved its summer school to Woodstock. The League had been founded in New York City in 1875 as an alternative to the mainstream National Academy of Design and had become one of the most important art schools in the country. From 1906 to 1922, and again from 1947 to 1979, the Art Students League brought as many as 200 students to the Woodstock area each year.

Birge Harrison taught at the summer school in Woodstock for its first five years. He had been the painting instructor at Byrdcliffe in 1904 and indeed there was much overlap of artists, both students and teachers, among the various organizations in Woodstock. As Harrison noted, “The desire is to develop a number of individual painters and not to develop a ‘school.’” Landscape was emphasized as much as the figurative tradition, and naturally, given the bucolic location, it became a focus for many artists working in Woodstock. 

Throughout the 1910s and 1920s, Woodstock artists associated with the Art Students League and others worked in a variety of styles. Some favored Birge Harrison’s subtle Tonalist approach; others, the painterly brushstrokes and light of Impressionism; and still others the jewel-like tones of the Post-Impressionist palette.

Works influenced by a number of European avant-garde movements also made their marks in Woodstock. Among those experimenting with varying degrees of abstraction were Konrad Cramer, Andrew Dasburg, and Henry Lee McFee, who were dubbed the Rock City Rebels after the part of Woodstock where they lived. Cramer, born in Germany, drew upon his experiences there with the radical art of Der Blaue Reiter, a group that used exaggerated forms and highly keyed colors to convey emotion. Dasburg had visited France, where he met Henri Matisse, who emphasized color for its own sake—a style called Fauvism. In Paris, Dasburg also studied the work of Paul Cézanne and Cubism, perhaps the most influential of all modernist approaches, based on fragmented images seen from different viewpoints. Elements of all these styles are not only seen in the work of the Rock City Rebels but in that of other Woodstock artists as well.

Artists of all stylistic bents came together to establish the Woodstock Artists Association in 1919, a much-needed venue for exhibitions that remains active today as the Woodstock Artists Association and Museum

The Landscape of Memory explores a singular artistic vision through the Museum’s extensive collection of works by Frank C. Eckmair. An internationally recognized printmaker, Eckmair had an intimate affinity for the quiet landscape of rural central New York. His subjects included its farm fields, stone walls, abandoned homes, and old barns.

Through memory and direct observation, Eckmair created a poignant body of work that invites us to contemplate this historic and beautiful region. It is filled with, as he was known to say, “many things not to be forgotten.” 

Frank C. Eckmair
Morning Haze

The State Museum’s significant collection of material from the World Trade Center and objects from the international response to the events of September 11, 2001, tell the story of that day and its aftermath.

The World Trade Center: Rescue, Recovery, Response details the history of the World Trade Center, the September 11 attacks, the rescue efforts, the evidence recovery operation at the Fresh Kills facility, and the public response to the September 11th events. The exhibition includes many objects, images, videos, and interactive stations documenting this tragic chapter in New York and America's history.