The Hudson From Phillips 

Thomas Sully rendered "The Hudson From Phillips" in watercolor, during a period when landscape painting was intertwined with nation-building. Sully, an Anglo-American artist, captures the Hudson River, not just as a scenic view, but as a symbol laden with historical and cultural weight. Consider the indigenous peoples, who for centuries, lived in harmony with the land Sully depicts; their displacement and erasure is a haunting absence in this vista. It's impossible to ignore how landscape paintings such as these participated in the colonial project, romanticizing a tamed wilderness while masking the violent history of expansion. Here, the artist's gaze, and by extension ours, has a gendered aspect. The land, often feminized, is passively observed, ready to be possessed. Sully’s delicate washes and tranquil composition invite us to contemplate our relationship with the land, urging us to reflect on the narratives we choose to see and those we often overlook.