In Search of the American Identity

Sample Diary Entry: Hudson River Painters Story

DAY 1: Tuesday, 7/7/09-

First glimpse of mighty Hudson after NYC-- a narrow sliver of blue wedged between aging facades on Yonker’s main street. Destination: Hudson River Museum on the river’s eastern bank to view Dutch in America show. New Jersey’s rocky palisades rise starkly on opposite shore, looming in shadows of a high summer sun.

Observation: As I drive north beside river, appears decades of hardship and economic woes have hit these towns hard. In stark contrast to Hudson’s mighty vistas, glimpsed at every turn, towns and cities that once thrived here, now seem pale and broken by comparison. Yet, the names—Sleepy Hollow, Peekskill, Cold Spring, Annandale-on-Hudson, Red Hook--preserve a mythic and magical quality. During stop in Sleepy Hollow, NY, across the street from a National Sleep Center office, an impromptu conversation with story-teller in colonial dress about Rip van Winkle and the Headless Horseman confirms I am in a dream.

The river keeps its promise to awe and inspire. Thick grey clouds hang overhead all day, bellied with rain that refuses to fall. Break- through sun slants like columns in thick summer air, spotlighting patches on steep hillsides and river ...then a wind-whipped deluge late in the day, followed by a double rainbow over Hudson valley. I now believe no hyperbole in Thomas Cole’s paintings!


DAY 2: Wednesday, 7/8/09-

Continuing north, focus of riverside communities shifts from suburban to rural—compressed neighborhoods morphing to broad reaches of open farmland, new car lots to John Deere showrooms, CVS and strip malls to acres of corn, apples, cherries and vineyards in neat rows beside road. Sign in front of a house: ‘baby sheep and goats for sale’. ..just a half-day’s drive from the heart of the city.

Casting its spell, the Hudson continues to appear when tree lines parts, summer clouds piled high overhead, like rumpled pillows, lazy and slow-moving. Trains as long as city streets snake along the river’s narrow shoulders, appearing toy-like in the distance. Growling and frowning diesels pull cars behind in a clattering but obedient row, the wail of engines’ whistle their only complaint…plaintiff echoes in the valley.

Destination: Hudson, NY, the river’s namesake, south of Albany. Once a center for boat-building and brick making, here is another city whose restored buildings and quaint streets are lifting themselves out of a decades-long legacy of hard times—but without fail, one street in town leads toward the Hudson. Contrast of eternal river and places that time forgot, repeatedly juxtaposed. Nearby, Olana, hilltop home of Frederic Church, master painter of Hudson scenes, commands sweeping views of river and distant Catskills,rising blue-gray in the distance. Wonder how these local towns, in their day, squared with painterly ideal image shipped out to the world?

Read more about the Hudson River School of Painting at: http://www.artesmagazine.com/