WEEK #32 / The Saco River at Conway, New Hampshire

The Saco River at Conway, NH

James Aponovich

oil on canvas, 18" x 24", 2011

The White Mountains of New Hampshire were the original source of inspiration for American painters during the early 19th Century. They sought a visionary Eden here in the wilderness. It was all new and unspoiled. What was new quickly grew old. When The West was opened the painters ( along with the farmers) left New Hampshire for more opulent vistas.

This view of the Saco River Valley is named after one of those painters, Frank Shapleigh. Mount Washington is dominate in the distance.

George Inness

The Lackawanna Valley

oil on canvas, 34" x 50", 1855

Inness was commissioned by the Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Railroad to commemorate the new Roundhouse complex at Scranton, Pennsylvania. Here the instrument of progress is the locomotive and the landscape opened, trees felled and tracks laid. The West was opening.

Both Inness and myself sketched on site. The sketches were then brought to the studio where the actual painters were created.