Thomas Cole
A View of the Mountain Pass Called the Notch of the White Mountains
(Crawford Notch), 1839
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Crawford Notch gained notoriety in 1826 when a catastrophic avalanche took nine lives. Nathaniel Hawthorne wrote a short story commemorating the tragedy, which may have piqued Cole's interest in the New Hampshire site. Rather than concentrating on the human drama, the artist minimized figurative elements to underscore man's insignificance and vulnerability in the face of nature's unleashed fury. Amid a seemingly idyllic autumnal setting, the barely discernible settlers, a lone rider, and the stagecoach passengers all seem oblivious to the impending cataclysm. Only the brooding storm clouds gathering at the upper left offer a portentous hint of the disaster to come.
In addition to its oblique reference to a specific historical event, Crawford Notch also reflects a prevailing romantic belief: that the destruction of America's virgin forests was tantamount to sacrilege. By juxtaposing gnarled trees with freshly hewn stumps, Cole vividly underscored the environmental consequences of man's conquest of the wilderness.
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