Arts in America

The 1800s

Romanticism

• No, we’re not talking about love.• Romanticism is an art style, both for visual art

(paintings, sculpture) and literature (poetry, books and plays)

• It stresses the individual, creativity and emotion, and draws inspiration from nature

• Many romantic books, for instance, feature the wilderness and heroic individuals (ex: James Fennimore Cooper’s Last of the Mohicans)

American Art

• Hudson River School: Painted landscapes

• John Audubon: A French immigrant, he sketched and painted birds and animals across the continent

American Literature

• Henry David Thoreau: Stayed in the woods, wrote Walden about his experience

• Edgar Allan Poe: wrote poetry (The Raven), short stories (The Telltale Heart) and the first detective story (Murders in the Rue Morgue)

• Herman Melville: From New England, he wrote about the sea (Moby Dick, Billy Budd)