“To him it was all grandeur, beauty, color and light–nothing of man at all but nature, virgin, unspoiled and lovely”
Following the California Gold Rush in the 1850s, westward expansion in America increased dramatically. Facilitated by President Lincoln’s Pacific Railroad Act, thousands of Americans flocked across the country’s distant corners hoping to start a better life. To support this expansion, the U.S. Government organized expeditions to properly document these unknown regions. While certain parts had briefly been explored in the past, only limited written accounts existed of the scenery. As a result, these expeditions sought skillful artists that could properly capture the suspected beauty of this region and share it with the world.
In 1871, Dr. Ferdinand Hayden, the director of the U.S. Geological Survey led a group of fifty men to discover the region of Yellowstone in Wyoming. A.B. Nettleton, an agent for the Northern Pacific Railroad Company, suggested Hayden bring Thomas Moran who had been gaining popularity and was eager to make his first trip out west. Personally financed by Jay Cooke, a major American banker to whom he had promised several paintings from the trip, Moran joined the expedition and took off for Yellowstone.
Before arriving in Yellowstone, the expedition briefly stopped in Green River, Wyoming. An evolving industrial town, Green River was strategically located along its namesake river and the Cherokee trail, serving as a crucial point for travelers heading west. Upon stepping out of the train, Moran was instantly mesmerized. Dominated by the colorful buttes that occupy the Green River scenery was unlike anything Moran had ever seen nor could have imagined. At that moment he completed his first sketch of the trip.
Moran continued on to Yellowstone which became one of his defining subjects and established him as a major figure in the region’s history. His art served as crucial visual documentation and was fundamental to President Grant declaring the area America’s first national park in 1872. Commemorating this, is the tallest peak of the three tetons that is known today as Mount Moran. Yet surprisingly, Yellowstone isn’t the artist’s most common subject. Rather, it’s the Green River buttes that truly obsessed Moran. After his first sketch in 1871, he went on to complete over forty canvases of this subject over the course of thirty years.
Executed in 1883, Green River, Wyoming, is one of those exceptional works. Differing in composition from the 1871 sketch, this work glorifies even further the landscape’s commanding presence. The focal point of the image can best be identified as Castle Rock, the largest butte of the area and an inspirational subject to Moran. These sentinel-like geological formations weren’t revered solely by the artist; many scholars and travelers admired them for their monumentality and spiritual nature.
“It would seem as if a generation of giants had built and buried here, and left their work to awe and humble a puny succession”.
Emphasizing this, Moran includes Castle Rock and its surrounding cliffs not only into the background of the composition but also as a reflection in the foreground of the painting. The extraordinary presence of the scenery becomes inescapable and the artist's aim clear. Returning to this subject so many times, Moran no longer sought to simply document this region, rather, he wanted to capture the sublime and immortal quality of this special landscape. To accomplish such a task, Moran looked to his artist hero, JMW Turner. The romanticist master had been widely recognized for his illustrious maritime scenes. During his studies, Moran had long admired Turner and his ability to transcend truth and enhance the beauty or nuance of a landscape by slightly deviating from reality. This would entail strategically enhancing colors and sometimes adding or removing subjects from the composition.
A similar approach is exercised with Green River, Wyoming. Despite Green River being a rising railroad town, Moran eliminates any signs of civilization, depicting the landscape as purely untouched by the modern world. In doing so, he brings into focus the raw physical and ethereal beauty of this American natural wonder. In the 1880s, drawing from Turner’s quick and vivid brushwork, Moran entered the most experimental and painterly period of his career.
Displayed in the present work, Moran’s creative layering of various tones creates a unique atmospheric perspective, drawing the viewer into landscape as if they were there. Capturing this effect and correspondingly mythicizing the subject is precisely what established Moran as a 19th century master of American painting. Green River, Wyoming is a superb and unique example of this artistic mission.
“Thomas Moran’s West was both sacred and profane, a world of unspeakable beauty and limitless power. By images, he made the West an indelible part of American consciousness, while reflecting that society back to itself”