Thomas Moran Highlights, 1890s
Specters from the North
In April 1890, Thomas Moran sailed aboard a White Star liner from New York City to Europe accompanied by his wife, Mary Nimmo Moran (1842–1899). When the ship was several days out at sea, reports circulated among the passengers that an iceberg was adrift nearby.1 Moran spent hours on deck in freezing temperatures sketching the glacial behemoth, complete with notations on longitude and latitude.2 These quickly executed drawings impart Moran’s excitement as he encountered an iceberg firsthand. Later, the artist would channel the thrill of that moment into this oil painting, Specters from the North.3 Even though it was more than two decades before the RMS Titanic would sink after hitting an iceberg, Moran clearly appreciated the danger the bergs presented, as evidenced by the wreckage he portrayed in the painting’s foreground. This bit of battered wood was also a reference to Frederic Edwin Church’s The Icebergs (1861, Dallas Museum of Art, 1979.28) and although not obvious, the title of Moran’s work creates an additional connection to Church’s painting.
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Print C: Grand Cañon of the Colorado River, Arizona
Thomas Moran’s involvement in a variety of commercial enterprises included working with the publishers of chromolithographs and the companies that used their services. Besides providing the artist with supplemental income, chromolithographs brought Moran’s work to an extensive audience.1 In 1892, the Santa Fe Railroad contracted with the American Lithograph Company and lithographer Gustave H. Buek (1850–1927), to produce a chromolithograph after a painting to be created by Moran.2
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Stream from Faithful
Like the famous Yellowstone geyser depicted here, Thomas Moran’s artistic habits could be described as “Old Faithful” for their consistency. When he returned to Yellowstone in 1892, he continued the habit of a lifetime—field sketches with notations. In this drawing, Moran made extensive color notations, perhaps because the hues did not seem possible. Orange to surround the stream from the geyser and more orange on the horizon? The note near the dip in the land, “W. Blue, sunset,” explains the extraordinary colors: Moran was fortunate to witness the Old Faithful geyser erupting at sunset, no doubt a stunning site.
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Lower Falls, Yellowstone Park
“Mr. Moran is on his way to Yellowstone National Park. He will be accompanied by W. H. Jackson of this city and the world’s fair commissioners for Wyoming, the object of the trip being to secure materials for a large picture to be exhibited at the fair.”1 —Rocky Mountain News (Denver, CO), June 18, 1892
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