Romanticism – an art movement that originated in the late 18th century that countered the new world of the industrial revolution. Romanticism mostly focuses on the beauty and awe of the natural world and the belief that life before the ‘new world’ was greater. Typically, artists in this genre are people who see themselves as casual observers of the modern world.

Origin of Romanticism

Romanticism paintings of this time mostly focused on the beauty of landscape art and the natural world that was being taken away from people due to the industrial revolution. In fact, the industrial revolution is part of the reason for the existence of romanticism. However, the origin of romanticism came from the time before the industrial revolution, the age of enlightenment. The age of enlightenment is described as the age of reason, when people began to think more factually and scientifically than emotionally, putting reason over superstition.

However, some people of the time felt that the age of enlightenment removed emotion too much from their art, and eventually those people started to feel resentment to looking at the world in a scientific, super realist way. Rather, people felt that emotion should be presented a lot more in art, and that people shouldn’t constantly think in rationality, rather they should think more about the things that they don’t fully understand or can’t completely comprehend. This is where romanticism began, however only a small number of romanticists began to paint the sublime landscapes of the natural world. Although, the idea that the new age of the industrial revolution was stripping humanity from its animalistic, natural roots began to grow, and people started to look towards romanticism and the beautiful sublime landscape paintings.

Romanticism on its own can be used in many ways. In the painting below, romanticism is used to demonstrate the beautiful world that the industrial revolution was stripping away from society. In other cases, it can be used to present the problems within the new society that was forming.

Sublime

Sublime – a combination of extreme beauty and overwhelming scale that evokes a strong emotional reaction.

Romanticism and the sublime go hand in hand when it comes to art. This is because, on its own, the sublime is such an overwhelming emotion that an artist is able to recreate using the vast landscapes of the rural (romantic) world.

An example of this is Edwin Deakin, an American-British artist that was well known for his paintings of romantic and sublime landscapes.

In this painting, which was painted sometime in the 1800s, Deakin has presented romanticism by demonstrating the beauty of the natural landscape and painting trees and colourful grass, and presents sublime by painting the distant vast cliffs and mountains of the Yosemite valley. This example of romanticism isn’t meant to send a grand message just about the greatness of the natural world, instead it also captures the vast and powerful landscape. The sublimity of the painting is shown through the overwhelming scale of the mountains against small and meager humanity.

The awe that is created by these views and landscapes is described very well by an English philosopher called Edmund Burke. Burke, born in 1729, wrote many books about romanticism and the sublime, and is a well known figure in the romanticism world. In a book he wrote about the sublime and the beautiful, Burke stated “terror is in all cases whatsoever, either more openly or latently, the ruling principle of the sublime”. This quote is saying that the emotional reaction to the sublime is created by the fear of insignificance and being small in the world in comparison to the magnificence and size of these incredible landscapes.

John Constable

This is a painting by John Constable, a notable figure in English landscape painting during the 1800s. Constable was also a romanticist himself, and has painted many nature landscapes that sometimes tell a deeper story. This painting, named ‘The Hay Wain’, is a very good example of this.

At first glance, the painting appears fairly ordinary. It depicts an English landscape with green trees, large and open meadows and shallow rivers that appears bliss and free, like a utopia. However, on deeper inspection there are details that imply further meaning to the painting. Firstly, the house on the left appears unkept and poor. In addition to this, a shoddy horse carriage, also called a ‘hay wain’, carrying two men can be seen in the foreground of the painting. These two details imply that this landscape could not be as bliss and free as it seems. It could be interpreted as a demonstration of what was going on between the socio-economic classes in England at the time. This is because it was common for large and wealthy land owners to use their class and power to control the farming happening around their property so that they could make money off of the poor farmers. This is what could be happening in the painting, because there is a difference in cleanliness between the background, where there is a large open meadow with animals and nice green trees, but in the foreground the trees are dark and the ground is muddy and unappealing.

Romanticism in Photography

Since then, romanticism has changed drastically. Photography was introduced in the mid 1800s. It was a completely new way of presenting art. At the same time, the industrial revolution continued to grow, cities got bigger, populations grew and the yearn for the natural, romantic world was more prevalent than ever. This meant that more and more people were drawn to photography and paintings to express their love for the rural world.

One of these people was Roger Fenton. He was born in 1819, and most likely grew up being influenced by the romanticism of the time.

This is a photo that Roger Fenton took in Wales, in the small village of Bettws-y-Coed. The photo depicts a small waterfall, surrounded by rocky surfaces, with trees in the background. In the far distance, we can see a few houses. Although most likely not intentional, the distant houses could imply the romantic view that the natural world is best, and that the man-made world should be kept distant. This photo is actually a recreation by Fenton from Thomas Roscoe’s guidebook, where he details this exact position where you must stand. At that standpoint, where you are almost level with the upstream, and you are very much involved with the elements of the stream. This could be interpreted as a romantic, as you are more involved with nature.

In the 1900s, landscape photography began to change. Photography had since developed and had become a lot more mainstream, especially during and after the second world war. This was when photographers like Ansel Adams became very well known for their romantic landscape photography.

This is probably Ansel Adams’ most famous photograph. The photo details a wide river, deep in the forests of Wyoming, which passes by miles of wilderness, and leads the eye towards the distant snow coated Teton mountain range. In this location, the viewer feels very involved and deep in the wilderness. There is most likely no civilisation for miles. This photo is the encapsulation of romanticism and the sublime. It probably demonstrates the exact emotion that Edwin Deakin, John Constable and Roger Fenton felt towards romanticism. The vastness of the distant mountains create such a great feeling of sublime, and the many miles of trees, rivers and wilderness evoke passionate emotion for romanticism. To the viewer, it feels as if they are there themselves.

Summary

Romanticism and the sublime go hand in hand when it comes to depicting the natural world. It is the key to creating incredible paintings and photographs that create such mesmerising emotions. Those who have mastered it have become highly praised for their work and their ability to put so many minds in awe of nature and chasing a romantic dream.

The most important factor when creating a romanticism painting or photograph is sublimity. Whether it is large cliffs, mountains, incredible distances or a combination of all, an artist must include some sort of awe inspiring detail or scale in their work to evoke a sublime emotion.