Father of Sunsets+ --- Days 14/187 & 188

Walks: Hood, Sloat Garden Center

Distances: 5.5, 3.5 miles

Claude Lorrain (Fr. working in Italy, 1604/5-1682), Seaport at Sunset, 1639

Claude Lorrain, View of Tivoli at Sunset, Oil on canvas, 1644 39 1/2 x 53 1/2  

So, if the artist Claude Lorrain had called himself a landscape painter at the beginning of his career, it would have been a very short one indeed.  In his era 'landscape' was simply the outdoors one had to toil in or contend with and paintings of it were among the least prestigious.  History painting was the thing so he invented historical people engaged in historical activities surrounded by classical architecture.  And placed them in front of his real subject: idyllic landscapes illuminated by atmospheric, radiant skies. 

And, within just a few years, he had singlehandedly elevated the prestige, collectability and popular enjoyment of landscape art.  This was not coincidental and the look of his art wasn't a 'schtick' to sell. He deeply loved nature, felt compelled to portray its beauty and needed to invent techniques to do that.  According to his fellow painter, Sandrart, Lorrain would lie out in the fields from dawn to dusk storing up the visual effects of light in his brain. Then, he would make ink and chalk studies on paper, bring them back to his studio and work alone to complete the complex and costly process of making a large, detailed landscape.  This intensely personal relationship between artist and subject resulted in works that have a simple honesty filled with an almost religious belief in the beauty of nature.  

And spoke to the public.  He became highly collectible by those mostly upper class, mostly affluent, mostly English young men, undertaking the rite of passage 'Grand Tour.' Of these there were many; they traveled through Europe, typically accompanied by a tutor or family member, with the Italy the prime taste educational destination. And many of those young men returned home with a painting by the artist already known by the prestigous one name:Claude.

In fact Claude paintings became so popular they were subjected to many forgeries.  To defend against this and to ensure he, not forgers, got the monies and recognition due, he produced the "Liber Veritatis." Defined "Book of Truth," it contains drawings that detail nearly 200 of his compositions on canvas. Residing in the British Museum it has been invaluable in authenticating Claude's work over the decades.  But it may be even more important as a means of bringing Claude's landscape techniques before developing artists. The prints made from the book were increasingly detailed so that drawing teachers began recommending them for copying thus influencing the development of future landscape artists and furthering the acceptance of landscape as a worthy subject of its own.

Claude's art had enormous influence on English landscape architecture in the eighteenth century as well.  Many of its manor houses were surrounded by parks specifically designed to look like Claude paintings.  The style came to be called 'picturesque landscape,' and none fit the description better than the English manor, Petworth, where the renowned J.M.W. Turner was a frequent visitor.  Turner revered Claude's work, and over a century after his death, took Claude's sunsets to new levels of atmospheric luminosity.

 

J.M.W. Turner, (English, 1775-1851), The Lake, Petworth: Sunset, fighting Bucks, ca 1829

Petworth interior with Turner paintings

Then another Claude - Monet - who encountered Turner's art and sunsets during a brief exile in London and returned to them several times later, took them another step into Impressionism, now the most beloved of all art styles

Claude Monet (Fr. 1840-1926), Sunset on the Seine at Lavacourt, Winter Effect, 1880