On the Saco 

Editor: This is "On the Saco," a painting attributed to Albert Bierstadt. It's rendered in oil and features this beautifully reflective river scene with cattle wading in the water. The overall feeling is very picturesque, almost idealized. What's your perspective on it? Curator: Well, considering Bierstadt's process, primarily working en plein air for sketches and then elaborating in the studio, we can explore the construction of this "natural" scene. He’s not just representing the Saco River; he’s producing a commodity, an image of unspoiled wilderness intended for consumption by a burgeoning urban class. The materials – oil paint, canvas, brushes – are the means by which he converts a landscape into a desirable object. Editor: So you're saying the romantic vision of nature is, in itself, a constructed product? Curator: Precisely. Think about the labour involved – from the manufacturers of the paints and canvas to Bierstadt himself, meticulously layering oil. He presents nature as boundless and free, yet its representation here is utterly reliant on industrial production and market forces. How do you see the animals fitting into this picture? Editor: I hadn’t thought about them that way. The cows seem…peaceful, pastoral. But maybe they also reinforce that idealized view? Curator: Exactly. They domesticate the scene further, reassuring potential buyers. The composition cleverly masks the true social relations at play here. It omits the labor of extraction, cultivation, and commodification necessary to make this “nature” accessible. Editor: That's fascinating. It shifts my understanding of the painting from a simple landscape to something much more complex about industry and consumerism. Curator: And that shift invites a reconsideration of the labour embedded within the image and how that labour becomes obscured in the final product.