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American Romanticism. 1800-1860 A Movement Across the Arts. Definition. Romanticism refers to a movement in art, literature, and music during the 19 th century. Romanticism is characterized by the 5 “I”s Imagination Intuition Idealism Inspiration Individuality. Imagination.
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American Romanticism 1800-1860 A Movement Across the Arts
Definition • Romanticism refers to a movement in art, literature, and music during the 19th century. • Romanticism is characterized by the 5 “I”s • Imagination • Intuition • Idealism • Inspiration • Individuality
Imagination • Imagination was emphasized over “reason.” • This was a backlash against the rationalism characterized by the Neoclassical period or “Age of Reason.” • Imagination was considered necessary for creating all art. • British writer Samuel Taylor Coleridge called it “intellectual intuition.”
Intuition • Romantics placed value on “intuition,” or feeling and instincts, over reason. • Emotions were important in Romantic art. • British Romantic William Wordsworth described poetry as “the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings.”
Idealism • Idealism is the concept that we can make the world a better place. • Idealism refers to any theory that emphasizes the spirit, the mind, or language over matter – thought has a crucial role in making the world the way it is. • Immanuel Kant, a German philosopher, held that the mind forces the world we perceive to take the shape of space-and-time.
Inspiration • The Romantic artist, musician, or writer, is an “inspired creator” rather than a “technical master.” • What this means is “going with the moment” or being spontaneous, rather than “getting it precise.”
Individuality • Romantics celebrated the individual. • During this time period, Women’s Rights and Abolitionism were taking root as major movements. • Walt Whitman, a later Romantic writer, would write a poem entitled “Song of Myself”: it begins, “I celebrate myself…”
Origins • Romanticism began to take root as a movement following the French Revolution. • The publication of Lyrical Ballads by William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge in 1792 is considered the beginning of literary Romanticism.
The Arts • Romanticism was a movement across all the arts: visual art, music, and literature. • All of the arts embraced themes prevalent in the Middle Ages: chivalry, courtly love. Literature and art from this time depicted these themes. Music (ballets and operas) illustrated these themes. • Shakespeare came back into vogue.
Neoclassical art was rigid, severe, and unemotional; it hearkened back to ancient Greece and Rome Romantic art was emotional, deeply-felt, individualistic, and exotic. It has been described as a reaction to Neoclassicism, or “anti-Classicism.” Visual Arts
Visual Arts: Examples Neoclassical Art Romantic Art
“Classical” musicians included composers like Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Franz Josef Haydn. Romantic musicians included composers like Frederic Chopin, Franz Lizst, PyotrIl’yich Tchaikovsky Music
1730-1820. Classical music emphasized internal order and balance. 1800-1910. Romantic music emphasized expression of feelings. Music: Components
Literature • In America, Romanticism most strongly impacted literature. • Writers explored supernatural and gothic themes. • Writers wrote about nature – Transcendentalists believed God was in nature, unlike “Age of Reason” writers like Franklin and Jefferson, who saw God as a “divine watchmaker,” who created the universe and left it to run itself.
American Romantic Movement • Reaction to Classicism—Age of Reason • Age of Reason • Rational thought • Social concerns • Reason & facts • Romanticism • Emotional thought • Personal concerns/experiences • Examination of inner feelings • Imagination & intuition Vernal Falls, Albert Bierstadt
American Romantic Movement • Romantics held a keen awareness of the past • Major themes: • Natural man • Lost innocence • Nature vs. civilization Street Scene in New York, Winter, 1855 H.V.V. Sebron
Folklore • Folktales, Myths, Legends • Oral tradition • Exists in variation • Often anonymous • Told by the common people of a particular culture • Often teach a lesson or moral truth about life • “The Devil and Tom Walker” by Irving 1824 • The Tragedy of Dr. Faustus by Marlowe 1564-93 • Faust by Göethe 1749-1832 The Headless Horseman Pursuing Ichabod Crane, Smithsonian American Art Museum, John Quidor
Detailed Characteristics • Values feeling and intuition over reason • Places faith in inner experience and the power of the imagination • Shuns the artificiality of civilization and seeks unspoiled nature • Prefers youthful innocence to educated sophistication • Champions individual freedom and the worth of the individual
Detailed Characteristics • Contemplates nature’s beauty as a path to spiritual and moral development • Looks backward to the wisdom of the past and distrusts progress • Finds beauty and truth in exotic locales, the supernatural realm, and the inner world of the imagination • Sees poetry as the highest expression of the imagination • Finds inspiration in myth, legend, and folk culture
6 Characteristics • Profound love of nature Sunset over Lake George, by John Frederick Kensett
6 Characteristics • Focus on the self and the individual Thomas Cole, 1842, The Voyage of LifeChildhood
6 Characteristics • Fascination with the supernatural, the mysterious, and the gothic • Dark, irrational side of the imagination Thomas Cole, 1842, The Voyage of LifeManhood
6 Characteristics • Yearning for the picturesque and the exotic Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone, 1872 Thomas Moran
6 Characteristics • A deep-rooted idealism • Idealism is the belief that true reality is spiritual rather than physical Thomas Cole, 1842, The Voyage of LifeYouth
6 Characteristics • Passionate love of country or nationalism Emigrants Crossing the Plains 1867 by Albert Bierstadt
American Romantic Hero • Is young, or possesses youthful qualities • Is innocent and pure of purpose • Has a sense of honor based not on society’s rules but on some higher principle • Has a knowledge of people and of life based on deep, intuitive understanding, not on formal learning • Loves nature and avoids town life • Quests for some higher truth in the natural world
The “Fireside Poets” • Because poems were read aloud at the fireside for family entertainment • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow • James Greenleaf Whittier • Oliver Wendell Holmes • James Russell Lowell • William Cullen Bryant • Subject matter: • Love, patriotism, nature, family, God, and religion • Comforting rather than challenging
Frederic Edwin Church, 1860, Twilight in the Wilderness, Cleveland Museum of Art
