Geological Time in Nineteenth-Century Landscape Paintings

Abstract

EVELOPMENTS IN GEOLOGY, science of earth, garnered wide publicity in popular press of nineteenth century and affected way artists depicted landscape. An examination of specific paintings in context of heatedly discussed scientific issues of day leads to a better understanding of meanings that artists were seeking to convey. Those artists who became increasingly conversant with geological concepts and their visual representation in scientific reports self-consciously changed way they looked at and painted earth in 1870s. Armed with scientific data gleaned from books and articles, they moved from painting pastoral landscapes that expressed aesthetic ideas toward geological renderings that specifically focused on scientific ideas. Among scientists and laymen most important concept discussed at midcentury was geological time. It raised significant questions about validity of traditional theories about origin of earth and sparked debates that fascinated a generation or more of lay readers who sought to reconcile divergent theories and new data. American landscape painters began incorporating scientific aspects of rocks and geological formations in their paintings as early as 1820os. It was at midcentury, however, that they were most encouraged to include scientific information in their works. This encouragement was given explicitly in books and articles such as Alexander von Humboldt's Cosmos, John Ruskin's Modern Painters, and Louis Agassiz's essays on geological research and by data emerging from surveys of regions in West that had previously been largely u xplored. All of these combined to make artists more aware of science of earth and of ways in which t could be incorporated in an artist's pa nting vocabulary.' A important geologic issue that captured artists' attention was geological time. In 1830 geologist Charles Lyell, an Englishman, set forth theory of uniformitarianism (the hypothesis that earth was formed slowly and uniformly over eons of time). Lyell's theory challenged scient fic ccuracy of biblical account of creation and argued against French geologist Georges Cuvier's theory of catastrophism (the hypothesis that earth was formed quickly by a series of catastrophes punctuated by periods of calm). The religiou implications of Lyell's theory made th issue of geological time vis-a-vis age of earth both s gnificant and controversial. Ever since geology h d been recognized as a science in 18oo, people had raised questions about age of earth, and Lyell's hypothesis intensified discussions. By 1850s debates between catastrophists and uniformitarians yielded to discussions of h w to comprehend geological time. The s ift reflected growing scientific and public acceptance of Lyell's theory and its very important corollary: that geological time was infinite. In 1856 a reporter pronounced to his literate public, the antiquity of Earth is so vast as to be illimitable. Yet concept was daunting. Agassiz categorized the immense periods which have