Day Thirty Six: Pastoral Pond by John Appleton Brown
Hello and welcome to day 36 of 100 days of Tonalism.
Today's study is of 'Pastoral Pond' by John Appleton Brown.
I had a feeling when I selected this painting to do a study of, that I could possibly run into some issues with finding biographical information about John Brown. It turns out I was incorrect as his full name John Appleton Brown did yield a small amount of information. I've read the short Wikipedia bio on today's video.
I've been speaking in recent posts about the defining aspects of Tonalism versus other styles of painting. Yesterday I made a deviation from that, to talk about the value of art, both intrinsic and financial. This got me thinking about an aspect of Tonalism that is often not mentioned but is certainly part of what makes it an interesting and a valuable movement in art.
Prior to the rise of Tonalism there was a movement in art referred to as the Luminists, also referred to as the Hudson River School. One of the foremost aspects of this movement was the luminous glowing spiritual light that infused their portrayals of the dramatic American landscape. Painters such as Albert Bierstadt, Frederic Edwin Church and others were very concerned with spiritual matters and endeavored to use their painting to inspire high spiritual emotions.
While Tonalism dropped many of the aspects of the movements that came before it (like the portrayal of expansive vistas and an overwrought approach to detail), one thing that it carried forward was the idea that spiritual values and insight could be invested into and conveyed by landscape painting.
At the time that Tonalism was popular it was common for these paintings to be framed with ornate gold leaf moldings. They were also placed in positions of prominence in people's homes. The idea behind this being to stimulate spiritual contemplation through the inspiration of the inherent beauty of nature.
Ideas like this have fallen out of vogue these days. If I were conspiratorially minded I would say there was an active agenda to keep beautiful art from achieving the highest degrees of success in the world of Fine Art. Instead of beauty we are often presented with vapid, supposedly shocking or ambiguously clever art.
Predictably the response to this "Modern" art by the general public is a numb stupor. Sorry, but this gives all art a bad name. A lot of modern art is spiritually empty if not outright psychopathic. Much of it reminds me of the story of the Emperor's new clothes in that people applaud what they think they should, rather than using personal intuition and insight to guide their perceptions.
Instead of art that ennobles the human spirit and lifts us up into realms of higher consciousness and greater sensitivity to life and our fellow man. We are presented with seemingly clever dreck promulgated as art. I for one am tired of it.
I think that artists who care about the true spirit of art and about their fellow man should be speaking out against this sclock. The "shock of the new" is not even very new, it's been going on for 100 years now. There is nothing new about it.
Now is the time to embrace art that empowers and supports us as people and that is one of the reasons why I have put this blog together to promote Tonalism. Tonalist paintings are beautiful and inspire beautiful thoughts. That's what the world needs, not clever crap disguised as art.
Cheers,
M Francis McCarthy
Landscapepainter.co.nz
A bit about "Pastoral Pond" by John Appleton Brown, I do not recall exactly where I found this particular image but I do like John's painting a lot. Although the composition is somewhat unconventional, it works pretty well.
I am happy with the way the study turned out and it is very close in spirit to the original painting. I would say the main thing that I enjoyed was capturing all of the varied greens and browns of the original, though to be honest, I played up the browns quite a lot more than John's painting.
To see more of my work, visit my site here.
 |
| Painted after - Pastoral pond by John Appleton Brown, Study by M Francis McCarthy - Size 5x7, Oil on wood panel |
Today's study is of 'Pastoral Pond' by John Appleton Brown.
I had a feeling when I selected this painting to do a study of, that I could possibly run into some issues with finding biographical information about John Brown. It turns out I was incorrect as his full name John Appleton Brown did yield a small amount of information. I've read the short Wikipedia bio on today's video.
I've been speaking in recent posts about the defining aspects of Tonalism versus other styles of painting. Yesterday I made a deviation from that, to talk about the value of art, both intrinsic and financial. This got me thinking about an aspect of Tonalism that is often not mentioned but is certainly part of what makes it an interesting and a valuable movement in art.
Prior to the rise of Tonalism there was a movement in art referred to as the Luminists, also referred to as the Hudson River School. One of the foremost aspects of this movement was the luminous glowing spiritual light that infused their portrayals of the dramatic American landscape. Painters such as Albert Bierstadt, Frederic Edwin Church and others were very concerned with spiritual matters and endeavored to use their painting to inspire high spiritual emotions.
While Tonalism dropped many of the aspects of the movements that came before it (like the portrayal of expansive vistas and an overwrought approach to detail), one thing that it carried forward was the idea that spiritual values and insight could be invested into and conveyed by landscape painting.
At the time that Tonalism was popular it was common for these paintings to be framed with ornate gold leaf moldings. They were also placed in positions of prominence in people's homes. The idea behind this being to stimulate spiritual contemplation through the inspiration of the inherent beauty of nature.
Ideas like this have fallen out of vogue these days. If I were conspiratorially minded I would say there was an active agenda to keep beautiful art from achieving the highest degrees of success in the world of Fine Art. Instead of beauty we are often presented with vapid, supposedly shocking or ambiguously clever art.
Predictably the response to this "Modern" art by the general public is a numb stupor. Sorry, but this gives all art a bad name. A lot of modern art is spiritually empty if not outright psychopathic. Much of it reminds me of the story of the Emperor's new clothes in that people applaud what they think they should, rather than using personal intuition and insight to guide their perceptions.
Instead of art that ennobles the human spirit and lifts us up into realms of higher consciousness and greater sensitivity to life and our fellow man. We are presented with seemingly clever dreck promulgated as art. I for one am tired of it.
I think that artists who care about the true spirit of art and about their fellow man should be speaking out against this sclock. The "shock of the new" is not even very new, it's been going on for 100 years now. There is nothing new about it.
Now is the time to embrace art that empowers and supports us as people and that is one of the reasons why I have put this blog together to promote Tonalism. Tonalist paintings are beautiful and inspire beautiful thoughts. That's what the world needs, not clever crap disguised as art.
Cheers,
M Francis McCarthy
Landscapepainter.co.nz
A bit about "Pastoral Pond" by John Appleton Brown, I do not recall exactly where I found this particular image but I do like John's painting a lot. Although the composition is somewhat unconventional, it works pretty well.
I am happy with the way the study turned out and it is very close in spirit to the original painting. I would say the main thing that I enjoyed was capturing all of the varied greens and browns of the original, though to be honest, I played up the browns quite a lot more than John's painting.
To see more of my work, visit my site here.
 |
| Original painting, Pastoral pond by John Appleton Brown |