Faith, Pain, and the Faraway: A Meditation on Landscape Painting with Alexander Nemerov

Sanford Gifford (1823-1880) made perhaps the most beautiful of all Hudson River School landscapes. Most notably, he was famed for his portrayal of the distance. Far horizons—hazy, luminous, otherworldly—were his special fascination. In this talk Alexander Nemerov will explore Gifford’s faith in the faraway in light of his close relationship with his troubled older brother Charles.

Alexander Nemerov is the Carl and Marilynn Thoma Provostial Professor in the Arts and Humanities at Stanford. He is the author of many books, most recently Fierce Poise: Helen Frankenthaler and 1950s New York (Penguin 2021), praised as “thrillingly alive” (Vogue), “masterful” (Los Angeles Review of Books), “gorgeous” (Newsday), and “lyrical, powerful” (Susan Stamberg, NPR). His next book, The Forest: A Fable of America in the 1830s, will be published by Princeton University Press in fall 2022.

Faith, Pain, and the Faraway: A Meditation on Landscape Painting is part of the free Contemplation by Design Summit, Oct. 25-Nov. 2, 2021.

The full Summit schedule is posted at: http://contemplation.stanford.edu/summit. All events are FREE and online.

After Sept. 1, 2021, REGISTER HERE