Shag Rocks, Nahant, Massachusetts 1860 - 1865

William Stanley Haseltine made this pencil and wash drawing of Shag Rocks, in Nahant, Massachusetts, sometime in the later 19th century. The rugged coastlines of New England were a popular subject for artists of the Hudson River School, who saw in them a sublime expression of nature's power. But what do these kinds of images mean in the context of their time? On one hand, they reflect a growing national pride in the American landscape, as well as a sense of manifest destiny. On the other, they tend to gloss over the social and economic realities of the time, such as industrialization, urbanization, and the displacement of Native Americans. As an art historian, my job is to unpack these kinds of contradictions, using historical sources and contextual analysis. By doing so, we can better understand the complex relationship between art and society, and appreciate the ways in which images shape our understanding of the world.