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  3. Hudson River School The Hudson River School encompasses two generations of painters inspired by Thomas Cole’s awesomely Romantic

Hudson River School The Hudson River School encompasses two generations of painters inspired by Thomas Cole’s awesomely Romantic

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问题                         Hudson River School
The Hudson River School encompasses two generations of painters inspired by Thomas Cole’s awesomely Romantic images of America’s wilderness in the Hudson River Valley and also in the newly opened West. The Hudson River painters, the first coherent school of American art, helped to shape the themes of the American landscape. Beginning with the works of Thomas Cole(1801— 1848)and Asher B. Durand(1796- 1886)and evolving into the Luminist and late Romantic schools, landscape painting was the prevalent genre of 19th century American art.
    With roots in European Romanticism and with correspondences to European painters, the Hudson River painters, nonetheless, set about to heed Emerson’s call "to ignore the courtly Muses of Europe" and define a distinct vision for American art. The artists translated these ideas into an aesthetic that was sweeping and spontaneous. Like the vast nation that lay before them, which they celebrated with a sense of awe for its majestic natural resources and a feeling of optimism for the huge potential it held, the Hudson River painters depicted a New World wilderness in which man, though minuscule as he was beside the vastness of creation, nevertheless retained that divine spark that completed the circle of harmony. Wilderness was something that Europe no longer possessed -it was uniquely American. These artists painted grandiose and detailed scenery of the Hudson Valley and New England filled with awe and optimism often combined with a moral message.
    As Thomas Cole maintained, if nature were untouched by the hand of man—as was much of the primeval American landscape in the early 19th century- then man could become more easily acquainted with the hand of God. Sharing the philosophy of the American Transcendentalists that painting should become a vehicle through which the universal mind could reach the mind of mankind, the Hudson River painters believed art to be an agent of moral and spiritual transformation.
    The impetus to celebrate the glories of the Hudson Valley began before Thomas Cole, but it was Cole with his literary and dramatic instincts and his years of European study who made the most coherent and articulated case for a new art for a new land. He did much to revolutionize not only the styles and themes of American painting, but the methods. Cole sketched from nature, frequently dramatic scenes in the Catskills or White Mountains, and then returned to his studio to compose his large scale canvasses, alive with tactile brushwork and atmospheric lighting that seemed to breathe.
    The influence of the Hudson River School was carried into the mid-19th century by artists like John Frederick Kensett and Martin Johnson Heade, who came to be known as Luminists because of their experiments with the effects of light on water and sky, and by Frederic Edwin Church. Church, who based himself in his panoramic home in the Catskills at Olana, sought more extensive horizons for his canvasses. Like Walt Whitman he tried to contain multitudes. He traveled the globe, painting scenery from the Hudson Valley to the American West to the Andes, Amazon, and Arctic, and he laid the foundation for the post-Civil War generation of landscape painters.
    A painting which has become a virtual emblem for the Hudson River School is KINDRED SPIRITS by Asher B. Durand, which hangs in New York City’s Public Library. In it Durand depicts himself, together with Cole, on a rocky promontory in serene contemplation of the scene before them: the gorge with its running stream, the gossamer Catskill mists shimmering in a palette of subtle colors, framed by foliage.(A)In the foreground stands one of the school’s famous symbols—a broken tree stump—what Cole called a "memento mori" or reminder that life is fragile and impermanent;(B)only Nature and the Divine within the Human Soul are eternal.(C)As Cole and Durand firmly believed, if the American landscape was a new Garden of Eden, then it was they, as artists, who kept the keys of entry.(D)
According to the passage, what is the common theme depicted by the artists of the Hudson River School?
选项 A、Poetry is the highest form of art.
B、The human soul can be lifted up by Nature.
C、Man can transform Nature.
D、Art is superior to life.
答案B
解析 本题为事实信息题，主要考查考生是不是能够有效地抓住文章中阐明的信息并排除干扰项。题目问：根据文章的内容，哈得逊河学派所描述的共同主题是什么?根据第二段第三旬的内容“Like the vast nation that lay before them…the Hudson River painters depicted a NewWorld wilderness in which man，though minuscule as he was beside the vastness of creation，nevertheless retained that divine spark that completed the circle of harmony”以及第六段后半段“only Nature and the Divine within the Human Soul are eternal”可知，此题正确答案为选项B，即人的灵魂可以通过自然的力量而得到升华。
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