A Tribute to Tonalism

On the Occasion of George Inness' 192nd Birthday
(or, I Bet You Will Not Be Surprised I Love the Tonalists...)

by Jennifer L. Hoffman

Note: This post is going up a bit late for April due to a series of technological issues, but the delay makes this post even more timely;  George Inness was born May 1, 1825.  If you aren't familiar with Inness' work, he was one of the primary influences on the Tonalists, one of my favorite movements in art history. (You can see another of my favorite Inness paintings here; I recently got to see this painting in person at the Art Institute of Chicago!  Unfortunately I am not able to reproduce it on the blog due to usage restrictions, but it is worth a click.)

George Inness, Spring Blossoms, Montclair, New Jersey, c. 1891, oil and crayon or charcoal on canvas, 29 x 45 1/4 in.  Metropolitan Museum of Art, Gift of George A. Hearn, in memory of Arthur Hoppack Hearn, 1911.

What is Tonalism?

Tonalism was an American art style that emerged in the 1880s, a movement of poetic, mystical, spiritual paintings - mostly landscapes - of a subtle, ethereal quality.  The palette of most works was harmonious yet reserved in color.  Shapes were often soft-edged; scenes appeared as if viewed through a veil of atmosphere.  Value shifts tended to be very gentle - big contrasts or bright light were avoided. Dawn, dusk, and night scenes of marsh, ocean, and meadow were favored motifs in Tonalist works.

Influences

The approach was an outgrowth from and a reaction to the Barbizon School, a French movement that rejected classical idealism in favor of depicting reality (see Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot, Jean-François Millet) and Impressionism, which was focused primarily on depicting color and light over form (see Claude Monet, Willard Metcalf).  

Many of the adopters of the Tonalist style were heavily influenced by James Abbott McNeill Whistler, the American expatriate whose work favored composition, abstraction, and tone over literal interpretation, much like a piece of music.  His artwork titles often referenced music, choosing words like arrangement, nocturne, symphony, variations, and harmony.  Whistler’s work broke significantly from the Impressionists of the day and caught the attention of young American painters. His nocturnes cross into otherworldy impressions; form and atmosphere are fused in a deceptively simple way that appears transient. In the introduction to his magnificent book, Like Breath on Glass: Whistler, Inness, and the Art of Painting Softly, Marc Simpson explains, "Softly painted art allows the observer to revel in the world's ambiguous edges, to feel the manifold potential of a perception...."1

James Abbott MacNeill Whistler, Nocturne, c. 1875-1880, oil on canvas, 12 1/4 x 20 3/8 in.  Philadelphia Museum of Art, John G. Johnson Collection ,1917.

Often called the “Father of American Landscape Painting,” George Inness (1825-1894) was an intellectual and philosophical force in the art world and arguably the first to work in the Tonalist style. Born in New York, during his early career he created paintings documenting the expansion of the Delaware, Lackawanna, and Western Railroad, depicting the landscape alongside industrial development.  As his style matured, he eschewed the industrial for more natural scenes of wilderness and farmland around the northeast.  He felt a strong spiritual connection to the landscape through his work.  In an interview with Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Inness stated, "The true use of art is, first, to cultivate the artist's own spiritual nature, and secondly, to enter as a factor in general civilization."2

Tonalists in Their Own Words and Images

Lowell Birge Harrison
In 1909, Birge Harrison published a book titled simply Landscape Painting which detailed his thought process and approach to creating a painting.  He coined the term refraction to describe how the edges of forms interact and, through the lens of the human eye, become vague and indistinct.  He recounted this story in the book:

A gentleman of marked intelligence and culture once berated me for what he termed the artist's impudence in giving to the public a smudge of greenish-brown or of gray up against the sky and asking them to accept it as a tree. "Why," he said, "I can see every leaf on that oak tree in the meadow yonder. And so can anyone whose eyesight is normal."

My reply to this was to pin a card to one of the oak's lower branches and ask my friend, standing at ten paces, to tell me how many leaves he could count without shifting his gaze from the white card.
"Well, by Jove!" he presently exclaimed, "I can't count up to fifty!"
"What do the rest of the leaves look like," I asked, "a more or less indefinite blur?"
"Yes! Just a blur." "Well," I said, " now you understand just a little of the meaning of the word refraction."3

Lowell Birge Harrison, Sunburst at Sea, c. 1913-14, pastel and graphite on paper, 27 3/8 x 30 in.  The Johnson Collection.

Dwight William Tryon

Dwight Tryon had a love affair with the landscape of South Dartmouth, Massachusetts, which he painted repeatedly throughout his career.  Revisiting an intimately observed and experienced subject is one of my fondest inspirations, and so I feel a kinship with Tryon's work (he also worked frequently in pastel).  Linda Merrill explains this tendency in An Ideal Country:

Certainly the object of his affection (a "dreary waste of upland or meadow," as one critic described the landscape) would not appear to inspire devotion, but "entire familiarity with all the physical facts must precede an understanding of the higher truths," Tryon maintained.  Art he defined as "love and sympathy with some near and homely thing."4

Dwight Tryon, Sunrise: April, c. 1897-1899, oil on canvas, 20 1/6 x 30 1/6 in.  Freer Gallery of Art, Gift of Charles Langdon Freer.

Did you know?
Charles Lang Freer, the American industrialist, was an avid collector of Asian art and was a patron of many of the Tonalists. His extensive collections formed the heart of the Freer Gallery in Washington, D.C., part of the Smithsonian Institution. Click here for a slideshow of Dwight Tryon's works in the Freer collection

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Charles Warren Eaton

Charles Warren Eaton remains an enigmatic member of the Tonalists.  Unlike many of his contemporaries, there are few interviews and personal letters, and no journals or writings to illuminate his inner thoughts.  But Eaton's distinctive, poetic compositions and sensitive light need little explanation.  In the book Charles Warren Eaton: Intimate Landscapes and the Tonalist Movement in American Art 1880-1920, David A. Cleveland asserts that Eaton was an avid poetry reader, "especially William Shakespeare, Alfred Lord Tennyson, and Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, who was known as the 'night' and 'twightlight' poet."5  I think that influence translates in his work.  Eaton worked in a variety of media, including oil, pastel, and printmaking.  I have included one of his wonderful monotypes below!

Charles Warren Eaton, Afterglow, n. d., oil on panel, 10 x 8 in.  Private collection.

Charles Warren Eaton, Landscape, c. 1910, monotype on wove paper, 7-13/16 x 6-9/16 in.  National Gallery of Art, gift of Jacob Kainen.

Gertrude Käsebier
There were several Tonalist photographers in the movement including Alfred Stieglitz, Edward Steichen, and Gertrude Käsebier. Käsebier was one of the few artists who was not from the northeast US. Born in Fort Des Moines, she moved with her family to Golden in the Colorado Territory at the age of 8, though she later moved to Pennsylvania. Her foray into art began in midlife; she attended Pratt Institute at the age of 37. One of the few Tonalist artists focused on portraiture, she also actively promoted photography as a career path for women, establishing the Women's Professional Photographers' Association of America in 1910. I am intrigued both by her imagery and her independent spirit!

Gertrude Kasebier, The Sketch, c. 1903, platinum print, 6 x 8-1/8 in.  Metropolitan Museum of Art, Alfred Stieglitz collection, 1933.

If you've seen my artwork before, you are probably not at all surprised that tonalist art has been influential on my approach to painting.  If you haven't, feel free to click over to my page at www.triofineart.com and see if you can recognize their influence on my work.  

Do you have a favorite period in art history?  Is there an artist that appeals to you more than others?  Please share with us in the comments!

This is only the briefest introduction to the Tonalist movement.  There are many more artists to explore.  I have included a bibliography and other suggested reading if you want to delve further into this inspiring and poetic period of art history.

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Footnotes:

1. Marc Simpson, Like Breath on Glass: Whistler, Inness, and the Art of Painting Softly (Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 2008), 6.
2. Adrienne Baxter Bell, Ed., George Inness: Writings and Reflections on Art and Philosophy (New York: George Braziller, Inc., 2006), 67.
3. Asher B. Durand & Birge Harrison, Landscape Painting combined reprint of Durand Letters on Landscape Painting & Harrison Landscape Painting (Minneapolis: Velatura Press, LLC, 2013), 76.
4. Linda Merrill, An Ideal Country: Paintings by Dwight William Tryon in the Freer Gallery of Art (Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution, 1990), 65-66.
5. David A. Cleveland, Intimate Landscapes: Charles Warren Eaton and the Tonalist Movement in American Art 1880-1920 (deMenil Gallery at Groton School, 2004), 33.

Other Suggested Reading:

• Ralph Sessions, The Poetic Vision: American Tonalism (New York: Spanierman Gallery, LLC, 2005).
• Joel Smith, Edward Steichen: the Early Years (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press in association with the Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1999).
• Robert H. Getscher, James Abbott McNeill Whistler: Pastels (New York: George Braziller, 1991)
• J. F. Heijbroek and Margaret F. MacDonald, Whistler and Holland (Amsterdam: Rijksmuseum, 1998).
• Arthur Wesley Dow, Composition (Berkely and Los Angeles, CA: University of California Press, 1997).