Sublime
The sublime emerged as a powerful theme in Romantic art, but it was first introduced as a concept by Edmund Burke in 1757 in his work A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful. He distinguishes the sublime from the beautiful, arguing that the sublime stems from experiences of vastness, terror, and awe that overwhelm the senses—while the beautiful evokes pleasure through harmony, delicacy, and proportion. These emotional responses, Burke claimed, are deeply rooted in human psychology and shape the way we experience art and nature. Artists like Géricault, Church, and many others turned to their canvases to portray scenes of astonishment, mortality, and existential dread.
Is the sublime responsible for the strongest emotion the mind is capable of feeling?
Church, Frederic E. Niagara Falls, from the American Side. 1867. oil on canvas, 257.50 x 227.30 cm. Scottish National Gallery.




