Thomas Cole

Thomas Cole was an English-born American painter and founder of the Hudson River School, a movement that celebrated the majesty of the American wilderness. His landscapes, such as The Course of Empire and The Oxbow, combine natural beauty with moral and historical themes, often reflecting on civilization’s rise and fall. Cole viewed nature as a divine creation and painted it with a romantic reverence. He influenced a generation of American artists, including his student Frederic Edwin Church. Though he died young, Cole’s vision of nature as a sublime force helped shape American cultural identity and national art.