Questions for Some of the Paintings

Questions for some of the paintings

Listed below are some of the works we studied during our visits to the FrancesLehmanLoebArtCenter. The questions were prepared by our VassarCollege docents to help guide the students as they explored the works. We tried to stay open to the kids' questions and responses. Not all of these works fall within the Hudson River School of Art, but they helped the children think about art and the role the Hudson River has played in the lives of people living along its banks.

1. Down the Hudson to West Point

Charles Moore, American, 1840-1930

Oil on canvas

Gift of Matthew Vassar, 1861.1.59

Questions: What do we see?

Name the painting’s elements. (mountains, river, road, boats, sky, plants)

Can you see people, or the evidence of people?

What do you think is important in the painting? (landscape, nature)

What might the artist be trying to say with this work?

. . . how beautiful the area is.

. . . how deserted the area is

. . . how the area should be kept or preserved, etc.

2. Panorama of the Hudson River from New York to Albany, 1845

William Wade, American (dates unknown)

Hand-colored steel engraving

6 x 96 unfolded

Special Collections, VassarCollege Library, 974.729 W119

Questions:What do you think this is? (A map).

Do you recognize any of the places depicted on the map?

How is a map different from a landscape?

They both depict the land.

Which has more detail, the map, or the landscape painting?

How does the map show rivers, towns, trains, etc?

(pictographs, different ways of representation, abstraction.)

What do you think the map was used for?

Explain a little about how the map was used. It was for tourists who cruised up the Hudson River from NYC to Albany -- a popular trip at the end of the 19th century. They would take these cruises and buy the maps so that they could recognize the sights they passed as they traveled up the River.

3. Cloud Bank, 1949

Lyonel Feininger, American, 1871-1956

Oil on Canvas

Gift from the collection of the late Katherine Sanford Deutsch, class of 1940, 1994.9.5

Questions:What is being shown in this painting?

Is it the same type of things that we saw in the last painting?

Does it have the same objects as the last painting? (Yes -- boat, water, land).

What's different about this painting? (How it’s painted -- not clear, abstract.) What do you think those lines are? (Lines in the atmosphere that are geometric and abstract. Much leeway for interpretation here).

4. Newport, Rhode Island

Albert Bierstadt, American, born in Germany, ca. 1880

Unframed: 14 x 18.5

Anonymous gift to school

Questions: Do you remember the Hudson RiverSchool of painting?

What did they do?

What is important in this painting? (The sea, cliff, rocks, boat?)

Are things painted realistically?

What type of day is it? Cloudy? Sunny?

What is the mood of the painting? Happy? Sad?

Does everything in the painting look like it belongs? (Is everything stylistically the same? Is the palate continuous through out the painting? Are the natural and man made objects dealt with in the same way or differently?)