Asher B. Durand
Asher Brown Durand, or Asher B. Durand, was an American landscape painter who lived from 1796 to 1886. He was essentially the leader of the Hudson River School of Art following the death of Thomas Cole in 1848.
Durand was born in New Jersey as one of eleven children. He started off his career apprenticed to an engraver with whom he eventually formed a partnership. He was well respected and nationally recognized for his work and his engravings were used on the very first postage stamps in the United States.
By 1835, Asher B. Durand was persuaded to abandon engraving for painting by his colleagues at the New York Drawing Association. He started with genre and portrait paintings, but by 1837, after an influential trip to the Adirondacks with the Hudson River School of Art founder, Thomas Cole, Durand began to create more landscape pieces.
Durand was a founding member of the New York Drawing Association, which was later renamed to the National Academy of Design. Between 1845 and 1861, Durand would serve as the association’s president. He also taught several classes there, and had several prominent artists as pupils, including George Inness. Unlike other artists of the day, Durand often employed a ‘portrait’ orientation in his work. He preferred to let the trees frame the scenery, which became part of his signature style. His specialty was his attention to detail. He was an advocate for realism in his landscapes and preferred to work directly from nature, seeing it as a direct product from the hand of God.
In 1869, Durand officially retired from the art world. Every artist knows that it is truly hard to retire from what you love, and Asher B. Durand painted into his 80’s, creating his last piece in 1879, just seven years before he died at the age of 90.
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