![]() During the same years that Cole was producing his scenes from James Fenimore Cooper’s famous novel, the French-Brazilian artist Félix Émile Taunay (1795–1881) was also drawn to Cooper’s use of the wilds of upstate New York as a setting for historical fiction. But the focus on Cole’s role within American art history has prevented consideration of his work in the context of art developments in both American continents. Landscape with Figures: Scene from “The Last of the Mohicans” is one of Thomas Cole’s key contributions to the development of a uniquely American style of landscape painting based on the idea of the American wilderness. Learn more about this painting on the Terra Foundation website. The grandeur of Cole’s mountainous, autumnal landscape overshadows the dramatic narrative, reminding the viewer that there are greater forces in the world than human conflict and desire. Hawkeye, the book’s frontiersman hero, raises his rifle toward Magua, who dangles precariously from the cliff. The heroine, Cora Munro, clad in white, lies dying on a cliff beside Uncas, a Mohican who is killed while attempting to save her from Magua, a member of the enemy Huron tribe. Commissioned for display on the steamboat Albany, Landscape with Figures depicts the tragic climax of James Fenimore Cooper’s popular novel The Last of the Mohicans (1826). The hallmark of this group of artists was a uniquely American style of landscape painting that combined nationalist pictorial rhetoric with English aesthetic conventions. ![]() Famous for his unparalleled portrayals of the American wilderness, Thomas Cole was the founder of the Hudson River school.
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