The Gilded age

Episode number 4 of Series “American visions”.
America after 1865 was dominated by two vast images in addition to that of nature. One was the Civil War. The other was the machine. Both were deeply linked. The Civil War had torn America apart. No longer could Americans believe that their country was the New Jerusalem. The vivid pictures of Mathew Brady bore testament to this painful death of innocence. The assassination of Lincoln embodied a terrifying loss and, in mourning, America invented nostalgia. The late Hudson River School, the still-lifes of John F. Peto, and the work of Winslow Homer reflect this elegiac note. On the other hand, the mechanical forces which had created the first modern war were being put to work by the northern victors. People sincerely believed in progress through science. The works of man, they now felt, could rival God’s creation. The canvasses of Thomas Eakins, America’s greatest realist painter, are imbued with this faith, but the icon of the ‘technological sublime’ is the Brooklyn Bridge. It summed up the thrusting confidence of post-Civil War America and the advent of the vertical city. For the most part, American artists still looked to Europe. The new industries of steel, the railroads and shipping had created unbelievable wealth for a small plutocracy in the North. This was the Gilded Age described by Mark Twain and Edith Wharton. Written and presented by Robert Hughes.