#william keith

[theinternetarchive]

'approaching storm,' william keith, oil on canvas, 1880.

[forestdenizen]

William Keith

[oldsardens]

William Keith - Yosemite Falls

[neoboha]

An autumnal sunset on the Russian River evening glow (1878)

[pcttrailsidereader]

Before photography, painters provided the only way that the beauty of the Sierra could be shared more broadly.  Imagine living on the East Coast in the middle of the 19th Century and seeing images like those above or those of Albert Bierstadt (http://pcttrailsidereader.com/post/152773096089/german-born-although-he-was-only-one-when-his). The paintings above were the product of Scottish-born William Keith (November 18, 1838 – April 13, 1911), who spent most of his career in California.

Keith became a close friend of fellow Scottish-American John Muir (they were also born the same year). James Mitchell Clarke described their friendship as one “in which deep affection and admiration were expressed through a kind of verbal boxing, counter-jibe answering jibe, counter-insult responding to insult.”

Keith initially arrived in California in 1859 where the job he had hoped for did not materialize, so he set up his own engraving business.  He first studied painting with Samuel Marsden Brookes in 1863, and may have taken watercolor instruction from Elizabeth Emerson, whom he married in 1864. He was influenced by other artists including Albert Bierstadt (see above).

During the 1870s Keith painted a number of six- by ten-foot panoramas, including Kings River Canyon (Oakland Museum … see the bottom image image) and “California Alps” (Mission Inn, Riverside). These competed with paintings of similar size and subject matter by Albert Bierstadt and Thomas Hill.

[alrauna]

William Keith (1838–1911) : An Autumnal Sunset on the Russian River Evening Glow (detail), 1878, oil on canvas, 91.4 x 152.4 cm, Butler Institute of American Art, Youngstown, Ohio

[brooklynmuseum]

During the nineteenth century, Indigenous people and Euro-American colonists had differing views about land—which influenced the way the environment was represented by the artists of the time. Painters such as the Scottish American William Keith depicted the land in romantic ways, focusing on its majestic and pristine qualities, even though Native people had inhabited and maintained those lands for millennia. Keith's perspective as a settler is contrasted in the gallery with a hide painted by the Shoshone artist Cotsiogo. 

Indigenous understandings of the natural world shaped their language, daily life, ceremonies, clothing, and design sensibilities. Their worldview that human beings and the land are interconnected was the opposite of that held by U.S. governmental authorities, who regarded the land as something to be dominated, and removed Indigenous people from ancestral homelands to clear them for white settlers. The legacy of this colonial history continues today.

Installation view of American Galleries, featuring Cotsiogo (Cadzi Cody) (Shoshone, 1866-1912). Painted Elk Hide, ca.1900. Elk hide, pigment. Brooklyn Museum, Dick S. Ramsay Fund, 64.13. Creative Commons-BY [left] and William Keith (American, 1838-1911). Mount Hood, Oregon, ca. 1881-1883. Oil on canvas. Brooklyn Museum, Bequest of Mrs. Charles S. Cooke [right].

[portraits-of-iris]

After California Rain

William Keith