Landscape Painting

In 1855, Asher B. Durand, a founder of the National Academy of Design and a leading member of the Hudson River School, wrote a series of articles for his son’s art magazine, The Crayon. The nine articles, Letters on Landscape Painting, outlined Durand’s thoughts on learning how to paint landscapes. They are considered by many to be the textbook for the Hudson River School. In the early 1900s, Birge Harrison, a prominent figure in the American Tonalist movement and a director of the landscape school of the Art Students League, gave a series of lectures to the students at the League’s summer school in Woodstock, New York. He later compiled those twenty-one lectures into the book, Landscape Painting. Then, as now, the book was considered to be a standard work for students. This volume presents Durand’s and Harrison’s writings together for the first time. We will never know what each might have thought of their words being combined in such a way, however, over the years hundreds of budding landscape painters and professionals alike have found value in these writings.
It only seems fitting that the textbooks of two of America’s great landscape painting movements be made available in a single work.

Author Biography

Darren R. Rousar is an atelier-trained artist and teacher who writes books to teach you how to draw and paint. He does this by first teaching you how to see using Sight-Size. Darren has written six books, the most recent being The Sight-Size Cast (learn more here: https: //www.sightsize.com/the-sight-size-cast/). He has been teaching students how to see since 1988, both in the States and in Florence, Italy. Every other week he publishes an article on SightSize.com. In July of 2018 Darren opened Atelier Rousar online and launched its first course, Sight-Size Cast Drawing (https: //atelierrousar.com/sight-size-cast-drawing/). Through his publishing company, Velatura Press, he has also republished an expanded edition of E.G. Lutz’s 1921 book, Drawing Made Easy and edited a combined reprint of Asher B. Durand’s 1855 Letters on Landscape Painting with Birge Harrison’s 1910 Landscape Painting. Darren R. Rousar is an atelier-trained artist and teacher who writes books to teach you how to draw and paint. He does this by first teaching you how to see using Sight-Size. Darren has written six books, the most recent being The Sight-Size Cast (learn more here: https: //www.sightsize.com/the-sight-size-cast/). He has been teaching students how to see since 1988, both in the States and in Florence, Italy. Every other week he publishes an article on SightSize.com. In July of 2018 Darren opened Atelier Rousar online and launched its first course, Sight-Size Cast Drawing (https: //atelierrousar.com/sight-size-cast-drawing/). Through his publishing company, Velatura Press, he has also republished an expanded edition of E.G. Lutz’s 1921 book, Drawing Made Easy and edited a combined reprint of Asher B. Durand’s 1855 Letters on Landscape Painting with Birge Harrison’s 1910 Landscape Painting.