Introduction
Early Years
Yellowstone
Green River
A Western Triptych
Moran and Photography
Turner's Influence
Yellowstone and the Grand Canyon: Late Views
From Long Island to Europe
Watercolors
Final Years
From Long Island to Europe
Moran's paintings of the American West brought him both critical and
popular success, but he was always an artist of broad interests whose body
of work also included images based on historical and literary works, marine
subjects, pastoral views, and, surprisingly, urban and industrial scenes.
Moran's interest in marine painting may have been sparked by his older brother, Edward, who became a marine specialist, or by his study of the work of J.M.W. Turner, but it was surely stimulated by the construction of his summer home in East Hampton, on Long Island, in 1884. Located on Main Street, Moran's house and studio offered easy access to the beach. Frequent trips abroad also provided sketching opportunities. In 1890, for example, on a trip to Europe, Moran completed sketches of the icebergs that figure prominently in Spectres from the North.
In addition, Moran often accepted commissions for book and magazine illustrations that required travel. In 1877 he journeyed to Florida to prepare illustrations for an article in Scribner's. Shortly thereafter he began work on an ambitious history painting, Ponce de León in Florida. Engaged in a spirited rivalry for government patronage with fellow artist Albert Bierstadt (1830-1902), Moran had hoped to sell his Ponce de León to Congress. He was unsuccessful in his attempt, for the committee in charge of acquisitions noted that Congress had already purchased two paintings by Moran but only one by Bierstadt.
Increasingly during the 1890s the landscape of Long Island became one of Moran's favorite subjects. The artist's contemporaries, intrigued by the pastoral qualities of paintings like June, East Hampton, noted that the famous painter of American wilderness was equally adept at creating quiet scenes of domesticated landscapes.