Summer in the Catskills 1867

George Inness, painted "Summer in the Catskills," a landscape that invites us to consider the complex relationship between nature, agriculture, and human intervention in 19th-century America. Inness, deeply influenced by the spiritualism of Emanuel Swedenborg, sought to capture more than just a visual likeness; he aimed to convey a sense of the divine presence in nature. But let’s consider this pastoral scene through the lens of labor and land use. The Catskills, a popular retreat in Inness’s time, were also a site of significant agricultural activity. How does this painting reflect or obscure the labor that shaped this landscape? The cows grazing peacefully, the distant farmhouse, all suggest a harmonious coexistence, yet this belies the intensive work required to maintain such a scene. Inness’s ability to evoke a mood, a feeling of serenity, invites us to reflect on our own relationship with the land. It is a landscape that speaks of both the beauty and the complex history of our interactions with nature.