PSAT Writing and Language Practice Test 30: Hudson River School

Questions 38-44 refer to the following information.

Hudson River School

38 Excepted by art historians as the first truly American art movement, the Hudson River School movement began in the early nineteenth century. The first works in this style were created by landscape painters Thomas Cole, Thomas Doughty, and Asher Durand, a trio of painters who worked during the 1820s in the Hudson River Valley and surrounding locations. Heavily influenced 39 by European romanticism, these painters set out to convey the remoteness and splendor of the American wilderness. The strongly nationalistic tone of their paintings caught the spirit of the times, and within a generation, the movement had mushroomed to include landscape painters from all over the United States.

One factor contributing to the success of the Hudson River School was the rapid growth of American nationalism in the early nineteenth century. One 40 affect of the War of 1812 was that it instilled Americans with a new sense of pride in their identity, and as the nation continued to grow, a desire grew to compete with Europe on both economic and cultural grounds. The vast panoramas of the Hudson River School fit the bill perfectly 41 to providing a new movement in 42 art, which was unmistakably American. The Hudson River School also arrived at a time when writers in the United States were turning their attention to the wilderness as a unique aspect of their nationality. The Hudson River School painters profited from this nostalgia because they effectively represented Americans' perceptions of early America.43 Hardly not anyone questioned the view that the American character was formed by the frontier experience, and many writers wrote about their concerns regarding an increasingly urbanized country.

In keeping with this nationalistic spirit, even the painting style of the Hudson River School exhibited a strong sense of American identity. Unlike European painters, who brought to their canvases the styles and techniques of centuries past, the Hudson River School painters 44 sought neither to embellish nor to idealize their scenes, but rather to portray nature with the objectivity and attention to detail of naturalists.