Transcendentalism was an American philosophical movement set into motion by Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882).   It was one of a number of “Romantic” movements of the nineteenth century–which included the romantic poetry of Byron and Shelly, the religious mysticism of The Oxford Movement and the popularity of neo-gothic architecture–which turn away from the rationalism of the Enlightenment and sought out sublime experiences in which the individual was over-awed by the grandeur of nature and the divine.  The core idea of transcendentalism is nowhere better stated that in this excerpt from Emerson 1836 essay “Nature.”

The influence of transcendentalism can be seen in the work Walt Whitman and the park-scapes of Fredrick Law Olmsted.  The painting of the Hudson River School artists and the writings of Washing Irving also are harmonious with the aesthetics of romanticism and transcendentalism.

Return to the Sunlight and Shadow session.