: American painter Ralph A. Blakelock (1847-1919), one of the most
celebrated artists of the Nineteenth Century, will be the focus
of the season-opening exhibition at the Thomas Cole National
Historic Site.
The exhibition, in the Catharine Beecher Memorial Gallery on the
second floor of the Main House, will begin May 1 and continue
through October 31.
More than 20 original drawings, watercolors and paintings will be
featured as well as rarely seen paintings from private
collections and other unusual items such as Blakelock's palette
still covered with the artist's original marks and blended paint.
"To those who know Blakelock as the painter of dark and poetic
moonlit landscapes, I invite you to look again," said Elizabeth
Jacks, the director of the Thomas Cole National Historic Site.
"The objects in this exhibition are quite unusual. Some of them
were painted on the proverbial 'back of an envelope' while
Blakelock was confined to an institution without traditional art
materials. They tell a story of perseverance. Despite all of the
difficulties he encountered, Blakelock was a key figure in the
transformation of American landscape painting between the
Nineteenth Century and the Twentieth."
Blakelock, who was from New York City, loved to sketch the
wilderness and when he traveled to the White Mountains,
Adirondacks and Catskills, he was following in the footsteps of
Cole and other painters of the Hudson River School. In a recent
biography of Blakelock the author Glyn Vincent notes, "Blakelock
not only had solid American credentials, he was an artist who, in
Whitmanesque fashion, had provided a romantic and poetic vision
of America that Americans longed to recapture."
In the early Twentieth Century, Blakelock's luminous moonlight
paintings were a sensation with the public. A Blakelock landscape
sold for $20,000 in 1916, which was a record price for the work
of a living artist. The sale made him famous and newspapers
called him America's greatest artist. Yet at his moment of
triumph, Blakelock was struck by personal tragedy. What is now
thought to be late onset schizophrenia caused him to spend the
later years of his life in a state hospital, away from his
family, studio and the burgeoning New York City art scene.
Besides being a summer visitor to Catskill and painting the
Catskill Mountains on several occasions, Blakelock has another
connection to Greene County. Six years after Blakelock was first
committed to a state hospital in Middletown, his wife Cora and
children left New York City for the country hamlet of Leeds,
N.Y., just outside Catskill and several of Blakelock's
descendants live in Catskill today.
Current interest in Blakelock's life and works has increased with
the publishing of The Unknown Night: The Genius and
Madness of R.A. Blakelock, an American Painter, by
Vincent (Grove Press 2003).
The Thomas Cole National Historic Site is at 218 Spring
Street. For information, 518-943-7465. Hours are May through
October, Friday and Saturday, 10 am-4 pm, Sunday, 1-5 pm.
