Pastoral Scene

In the 1850s, the Lackawanna railroad company commissioned George Inness to create a series of landscape paintings that celebrated the country’s rapid development and progress. Even as Inness worked on this commission, he began moving away from the more realistic style of his teacher Asher Brown Durand and towards looser brushwork and darker, more atmospheric compositions. Inspired by the writings of American philosopher William James, who famously coined the term “stream of thought,” Inness began shunning all signs of industrial presence in favor of paintings that made the landscape a metaphor for human consciousness. Pastoral Scene is a transitional work for Inness, and the painting’s juxtaposition of a verdant tree with a branch stripped bare hints at Inness’ increasing ambivalence about industrialization.