Durand

Yesterday I went to Fundación Juan March, in Madrid, and I saw a great exibittion about Asher B. Durand, one of the most important American artists of the nineteenth century. I liked it a lot, and I wated to tell you about it.

Durand was born in 1796 in a farm in Maplewood (New Jersey) and when he was twenty settled in New York. He started his artistic career as engraver and later as portrait painter. Finally, in 1830 he started painting landscapes, that was what he really wanted to do. Today, his contributions are recognized as central to the development of American landscape painting.

In 1869 he retired to his family house in Maplewood and continued painting until the late 1870s. He died there in September 1886.

I liked the exibittion because I think Durand is a very talented artist, and there you can find many beautiful drawings and paintings by him.

Durand is not very famous in Europe and here it is hard to see paintings by him. The entrance is free so, why don’t you go there one day? If you go, tell me if you’ve liked it. In the walls of the exibittion there was this poem:

“Upon his canvas nature starts to life […]

yes, this is nature: living, breathing, warm”.

If you go, tell me if you’ve liked it.

Bye!