American Collection

George Inness worked as an engraver before he became a painter, although he was largely self-taught. He traveled to France in 1854 to study the landscapes of the Barbizon painters which directly influenced his intimate and emotional approach to American scenes. His admiration for the Old Masters, for Dutch landscape painters, and for Claude Lorraine, infused certain aesthetic concerns into his depictions of East Coast scenery, that sets his work apart from the Hudson River School and the Luminists. He moved to Montclair, New Jersey in 1878, which provided the subject matter for this painting. In the last decade of his life, Inness's work became much more abstract.