Beauty and the Sublime

“Whatever is filled in any sort to excite the ideas of pain and danger, that is to say, whatever is in any sort terrible, or is conversant about terrible objects, or operates in a manner analogous to terror, is a source of the sublime; beauty is a name I shall apply to all such qualities in things as induce in us a sense of affection and tenderness, or some other passion the most resembling these.” (Burke) Edmund Burke sees painting as two very different realms of emotions. On one side, there are beauties, which are the emotions that might cause feelings of calmness, gentleness, joyfulness, brightness. Where sublime emotions are darker and opposite of beauty, like, gloomy, tragic, strong and powerful. Beauty is an enthusiastic expression of pleasure or agreement. When looking at the beauty of art those senses is normally what draws a viewer to gaze at the painting. In Edmund Burke’s The Sublime and Beautiful, he defines beauty “as any quality which inspires the individual to feel affection that which is perceived as beautiful.” (Scott)

A main part of painting is emotions, the emotions of the painter either while painting or if it is the emotional reaction of the viewer. Beauty is something that is delicate and sparks a sense of lust through the body. Edmund defined beauty as such because of the way he looked at paintings and the way his body reacted to the paintings. On the other hand, Burke describes the sublime, “as being the cause of the strongest emotions which the individual is capable of feeling.”(Scott). He mentions numerous times that sublimity is derived from pain and the emotions associated with it. “While the beauty of a work of art may inspire love or admiration, the sublimity of a work of art may inspire sense of astonishment or the shocking feeling. Burke was the first to explain beauty and sublimity purely in terms of process of perception and its effect upon the perceiver.” (Victorianweb.org).

A prime example of sublime is the painting “A coming storm” by Sanford Gifford. Gifford was born and raised in upstate New York. Shortly after Sanford moved to Rhode Island where attended Brown University for two years. Later, he returned to New York to continue his studies in the field of the arts. It was to be said that when Sanford studied with drawing-master and watercolorist, Rubens, he learned to portraiture and topographical rendering. Portraiture is showing the object in its basic form or pose, while allowing the artist to show the persons personality (if it is human). During the summer of 1846, is when he made his revelation about his favorite kind of painting styles. Gifford became an admirer of the work of Thomas Cole. Thomas Cole is most known for being the creator of the Hudson River School. “The Hudson River School was a mid-19th century American art movement by a group of landscape painters whose aesthetic vision was influenced by romanticism.” (Encarta.com) Their paintings depict the Hudson River Valley and the surrounding area, as well as the Catskill Mountains and other predominant mountains in the United States. Hudson River School paintings were a reflect of the three major themes which were occurring in America in the 19th century. Those were discovery, exploration, and settlement. Many Americans were heading west and in search of new land to settle on and raise a family. New land and ideas offered new hope, which was a major theme. Their realistic, detailed, and sometimes idealized picture of nature portrays the Hudson River School landscapes. Gifford visited several of the same locations where Cole previously painted numerous works of art, such as, the Berkshire and Catskill mountains. His attendance to the Hudson River School was the major factor that affected his choice of art and his style he decided to follow.

What drew me to this piece of artwork was the aspect of light in the painting. The artist used the dark colors all around the painting to emphasize the light. The source of light slowly becomes in golfed from the dark clouds. His uses the effects of light in the landscape with aerial perspectives make the painting that more sublime. What the aerial perspective does is when the distance between an object and a viewer increases, the contrast between the object and its background decreases. He also uses a unique form of brushstrokes; he makes his brushstrokes seem invisible and does a good job of hiding his lines. I found this interesting because painters of that style are not known having their brushstrokes not so visible, where they normally do. The clean lines emphasize the stillness and depicts a very calm water and an even softer, but hazy skyline. The distinctive haze (or the cloudiness) portrays the aerial perspective and it adds to the illusion of depth depicting space on the flat surface, alongside the top of the clouds. The light comes through only hitting a small section of the trees and the mountains. This makes them the brightest part of the painting and creates the largest point for the eye to go to. Along with the aerial perspective, the use of his grey scale is very good. The gradation of the greys from the top of deep dark grey clouds smoothly blends into the lightness made from the disappearing light. This shows the disappearing light behind the coming before the storm. Its effects of light in the landscape characterize the painting. Gifford makes the piece of artwork like a poetic atmosphere. The trees, water, sky, all are like different lines of a poem, which smoothly blend to make the entire poem a whole. I also really liked his choice of colors for the painting. Actually, what I meant to say is, I like how accurately he is most likely depicting the setting. I forgot that most of his paintings were his visions, which were seen in front of his eyes. The colors are a great part of why the painting is so sublime, dark, deep, natural reds from the autumn trees offers this sense of peace, which is going to be disrupted. Burke describes the sublime, “as being the cause of the strongest emotions which the individual is capable of feeling.” (Scott). The strongest emotion is sense of eagerness and fear. The viewer can see the dark clouds beginning to take form and realizes that nothing else had been disrupted. Those dark clouds show the viewer something is coming in the immediate future. The dark, gloomy colors are the major factor why I thought is was a good example of sublime in a painting. The only source of light is slowly depreciating and causing this dark force to enter over the water. The light creates this effect of heavenly presence because it seems to be the only pure thing left in the painting. What I mean by that is that when the clouds overcome the objects in the painting they in a way take their innocence