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William James Stillman
The Philosophers' Camp in the Adirondacks
1858
oil on canvas
Boston became an epicenter for Humboldtian thinkers, among them transcendentalist writer Ralph Waldo Emerson and scientist Louis Agassiz. They were among the Boston intellectuals who spent August 1858 in the Adirondacks at a gathering organized by the artist William James Stillman. Emerson, whose essay Nature was deeply influenced by Humboldt and who shared his abolitionist views, stands at the center of the painting, rapt in the experience of nature. On the left Louis Agassiz dissects a fish, having brought his classroom into the woods. Agassiz was among Humboldt's protégés, yet his research on human anatomy led him to conclude that the white race was superior to all others, a position that dismayed Humboldt. The tension between their views is similar to a question found in Eastman Johnson's painting of Mount Vernon: how can people hold ideals of equality and yet sanction slavery? How can two men with opposing views remain respectful of each other despite the gulf dividing their beliefs?
Courtesy William Munroe Special Collections -- Concord Free Public Library Corporation |