Landscape Painting

Almy Pond, Newport, c. 1857
Object-John Frederick Kensett, Almy Pond, Newport
One of the most prolific and influential American landscape painters of the mid-nineteenth century, John Frederick Kensett is best known for his small-scale, luminous coastal scenes of Connecticut, Massachusetts, New York, and Rhode Island. While Kensett painted many scenes of Newport, Rhode Island, a popular northeastern tourist destination, Almy Pond, Newport uniquely portrays the seaside town as a pastoral community. The flat, expansive scene includes both the eponymous pond and Spouting Rock, two landmarks recognizable to locals and travelers alike. Animating the otherwise still scene, a farmer, his three children, and their black dog traverse the field toward grazing cows in the distance. The painting suggests a return to rural values and a reaffirmation of the pre–Civil War transcendentalist belief in the sacredness of nature. It also demonstrates Kensett’s ability to imbue a specific local landscape with a broad cultural theme.
Learn more about this painting on the Terra Foundation website.
Almy Pond, Newport, c. 1857
Landscape Painting

Landscape with Figures: A Scene from "The Last of the Mohicans", 1826

The Promised Land - The Grayson Family, 1850

Almy Pond, Newport, c. 1857

Our Banner in the Sky, 1861

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Brace's Rock, Brace's Cove, 1864

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Paradise Valley, 1866–68

Newburyport Marshes: Approaching Storm, c. 1871

The Sidewheeler "The City of St. Paul" on the Mississippi River, Dubuque, Iowa, 1872

On the Hudson near Haverstraw, 1872

The Iceberg, c. 1875

Indian Encampment, c. 1870–76