Frederic Remington's "nocturnes"

One notable absentee from the previous blog on American art is Frederic Remington, an artist whose work tends to be underestimated on both sides of the Atlantic. "Too damned popular, Fortarseskew! Cowboys? Phooey!" Two of my recent blogs have brought Remington to mind: 1) Karen Noles' pretty Amerindian girls in native costumes and 2) the UK's John Atkinson Grimshaw. There is nothing romantic about Remington's great painting The Herd Boy (above). The bare-legged young warrior is guarding the pony herd on a freezing winter's night. His windswept horse looks as miserable as its rider. This conveys to me the harsh reality of living a traditional nomadic life on the Great Plains. Remington's "nocturnes" - paintings capturing starlight, moonlight, campfires - show that he and Grimshaw were working along similar lines. Although their subjects were different, they both strove to capture light too subtle for the early cameras. Remington was particularly interested in flash photography. Click the title link to view an online record of The Color of Night - the only major exhibition of Remington's art ever - on the website of the National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C.