Frederic Church Week: Tuesday

These two studies by Frederic Church reveal how carefully he observed the sky. In the pencil Cloud Sketch, made between 1850 and 1870, he numbers and annotates subtle shifts in tone – ‘brilliant gold white,’ ‘warmer,’ ‘dark greenish blue,’ ‘smoky orange tinted‘ – like a personal code for capturing light. He also adds ‘cirri’ in a couple of places, which is likely a plural form of the cloud classification Cirrus used for high streaks of ice crystals. The term suggests Church was familiar with the system of cloud classification originating from England at the beginning of the century.

The oil study Clouds at Sunset was likely made in the following decade. Here, on Cumulus congestus clouds, Church’s notes have been translated into paint: cool blue shadows, warm peachy greys, and a fleeting blush of orange at the cloud tops. Seen together, these sketches show how Church’s depiction of colour and light in the air always began with careful observation.