Thomas Webster RA (10 March 1800 – 23 September 1886), was a British painter of genre scenes of school and village life, many of which became popular through prints. He lived for many years at the artists' colony at Cranbrook in Kent.
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Cole, Expulsion from the Garden of Eden
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Johannes Bartholomäus Duntze
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Transcription
DR. STEVEN ZUCKER: We're in the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston. We're looking at a really early Thomas Cole. This is the "Expulsion from Eden." DR. BETH HARRIS: Normally when we think about that subject, we might think about images from the Italian Renaissance, like Masaccio's "Expulsion from the Garden of Eden" or the "Expulsion" by Michelangelo on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. Those are paintings of Adam and Eve, of the two figures. But Cole has transformed this into a landscape painting. DR. STEVEN ZUCKER: We can barely find Adam and Eve. It takes us a moment, in part because they're so small. But he has given us this over-the-top operatic treatment that starkly contrasts the garden that is Eden, God's paradise, with the terror of the wilderness beyond. I read this painting from right to left instead of from left to right. I begin in the brighter Eden. And Cole has given us this fantastic vista. We can see these crystalline mountains that reach up to Heaven and then slope down to these lovely glades and a tropical paradise. And as we move towards the foreground, we can just make out two swans in a pool. DR. BETH HARRIS: We even see waterfalls down those purplish mountains. And this whole area of Eden is flooded with light. And everything seems verdant and lush. But that's contrasted with the left side of the painting, where we see Adam and Eve being cast out of the Garden of Eden. And we feel a blast of light that expels them from the Garden of Eden that obviously represents a divine force. Nature is much bleaker. Trees have been struck by lightning and ravaged by time. The colors are browns, and there's sharp contrasts of light and dark. DR. STEVEN ZUCKER: You can actually see a storm in the sky that frames a volcano. Adam holds his hand up to this forehead. Eve clutches at his hand. They know they're in deep trouble. And as if to make that point even more clearly, in the lower left, we see a wild animal that's felled a deer and is protecting it against an approaching vulture. This new culture, this new American nation, did not have what Europe had. It did not have ancient ruins. It did not have ancient cultures. But at the beginning of the 19th century, philosophers, and writers, and painters began to recognize that its wilderness was, in a sense, its great heritage. DR. BETH HARRIS: That's right, but American painters knew that landscape was a low kind of art in the hierarchy established by the academies in Europe. They knew that landscape was looked down on. And one way that you could ennoble a landscape and raise it up to a higher level, to the level of a history painting, was to make it the setting for heroic human endeavor for biblical stories. And that's exactly what Cole has done. American artists are always wanting to be taken seriously. But because of the artistic situation in America, they're often forced to paint subjects that their clients want, which are not the noblest subjects-- simple landscapes and portraits. DR. STEVEN ZUCKER: So this painting in some ways might have been a challenge to its American public, who were used to more prosaic images. And here, Cole is attempting something more ambitious. DR. BETH HARRIS: Cole wants to be a serious painter. And he can't do that by simply painting the Catskills, as he's going to later do. He returns again and again to these more serious subjects, "The Voyage of Life," "The Course of Empire." DR. STEVEN ZUCKER: But all stories that can be enacted in the landscape.
Life
Webster was born in Ranelagh Street, Pimlico, London. His father was a member of the household of George III, and the son, having shown an aptitude for music, became a chorister, first at St George's Chapel in Windsor Castle, and then the Chapel Royal at St. James's Palace in London. He abandoned music for painting, however, and in 1821 was admitted as a student at the Royal Academy, exhibiting, in 1824, a portrait of "Mr Robinson and Family". In the following year he won first prize in the school of painting.[1]
In 1825, also, Webster exhibited Rebels shooting a Prisoner, at the Suffolk Street Gallery - the first of a series of pictures of schoolboy life for which he subsequently became known. In 1828 he exhibited The Gunpowder Plot' at the Royal Academy, and in 1829 The Prisoner and A Foraging Party Aroused at the British Institution. These were followed by numerous other pictures of school and village life at both galleries. In 1840 Webster was elected an associate of the Royal Academy (ARA), and in 1846 a Royal Academician (RA). He continued to be a frequent exhibitor there until 1876, when he retired from the academy. He exhibited a self-portrait in 1878, and Released from School, his last picture, in 1879.[2]
In 1856 Webster was photographed at the Photographic Institute in London by Robert Howlett, as part of a series of portraits of artists. The picture was among a group exhibited at the Art Treasures Exhibition in Manchester in 1857.[3]
From 1835 to 1856 Webster lived at The Mall, Kensington, but the last thirty years of his life were spent at the artists' colony in Cranbrook, Kent, where he died on 23 Sept. 1886.[2]
Work
Webster became known for his genre paintings, often with children as subjects, depicting incidents from everyday life in a genial and humorous way. Many of these were exceedingly popular, particularly his Punch (1840) with which he procured associate membership of the Royal Academy.
In the limited range of subjects which he made his own, Webster was unrivalled. Some of his pictures - such as Please remember the Grotto, Snowballing and maybe The Swing - were issued as prints by Abraham Le Blond.[3] The Smile (1841), The Frown and The Boy with Many Friends, are among the numerous pictures which became well known by engravings. He also contributed work to volumes issued by the London-based Etching Club: The Deserted Village (1841), Songs of Shakespeare (1843), and Etch'd Thoughts (1844).[2]
Webster was influential on the work of fellow Cranbrook artists George Bernard O'Neill and Frederick Daniel Hardy.[citation needed]
Notes
- ^ Chisholm 1911.
- ^ a b c Dodgson 1899.
- ^ a b Thomas Webster biography Archived 2012-03-07 at the Wayback Machine ("Leighton Fine Art).
References
Attribution:
- This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Dodgson, Campbell (1899). "Webster, Thomas (1800-1886)". In Lee, Sidney (ed.). Dictionary of National Biography. Vol. 60. London: Smith, Elder & Co. p. 127.
- public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Webster, Thomas (painter)". Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 28 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 464. This article incorporates text from a publication now in the
External links
- 44 artworks by or after Thomas Webster at the Art UK site
- In Sickness and Health (1843),
- The artist's father and mother (first exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1844),
- A Dame's School (1845)
- The Village Choir (1847).
- Thomas Webster online (ArtCyclopedia)
- Thomas Webster biography and works (Royal Academy collection)
- Thomas Webster biography and art (The Weald - people history and genealogy)
- The Dunce (c. 1850 painting)
- Thomas Webster at Find a Grave