Immanence, transcendence, and impressionism in late nineteenth century American painting. (Volumes I-III).

Abstract

This dissertation examines the painted embodiments of America's dominant philosophical, religious, and nationalist ideologies in the 1880s and 1890s. The liberal Protestant belief that the nation's evolution to a perfected state of life was immanent in the processes of culture provides the context for the discussion. The tonalist mode was viewed as a means of providing transcendent experience, in support of progress toward that higher order of life, while these beliefs affected Americans' reception and transformation of the impressionist mode was well. The principal ideologies of the period, as reflected in evolutionary thought, liberal Protestantism, and the beliefs of John Fiske, William James, and Emerson are summarized. Then the growth of liberal thought is shown to parallel American painters' gradual incorporation of the concept of divine immanence into their portrayals of nature in the 1860s and 1870s. The third chapter recounts John La Farge's discovery and exploitation of Japanese visual modes for their naturalism and mysticism; La Farge's exploration of intuitionist styles was in advance of Protestant America's full embrace of intuitionism. The fourth chapter suggests the reasons why Whistler's unified tonalist system, resonant with his Spiritualist and implicit utopian beliefs, was seized upon by American painters. The fifth chapter elucidates how the works of Thomas W. Dewing embody the essence of American liberalism. It traces the contributions to his thought of his wife, Maria Oakey Dewing, Transcendentalism, Spencerian evolutionary beliefs, the ideology of women, contemporary English art, and Pater's writings. His idyllic life at the summer colony of Cornish, New Hampshire, is reconstructed, and his relationship with Charles Lang Freer is examined for the way in which both artist and patron utilized the painted image as a means of self-culture. The sixth chapter surveys the American response to French Impressionism and illuminates Theodore Robinson's underst and ing of Monet's aesthetic. It concludes by examining the works and personal beliefs of John Twachtman, whose vision converged with Monet's in the 1890s.