U.S. #4920
2014 49¢ Distant View of Niagara Falls
Hudson River School Paintings
This stamp pictures an 1830 painting by Thomas Cole. It is one of four showing artwork typical of the Hudson River School movement. The stamps are the 12th issue in the American Treasures series.
In 1825, a young artist displayed three landscape... more
U.S. #4920
2014 49¢ Distant View of Niagara Falls
Hudson River School Paintings
This stamp pictures an 1830 painting by Thomas Cole. It is one of four showing artwork typical of the Hudson River School movement. The stamps are the 12th issue in the American Treasures series.
In 1825, a young artist displayed three landscape paintings in a New York City bookstore window. Thomas Cole (1801-1848) based the works on sketches from his travels in the Hudson River Valley. Landscape art existed before Cole, but his paintings captured nature in a new style. Well-known artist John Trumbull saw a groundbreaking “perception of the [American] wilderness” in Cole’s work and promptly purchased one of his paintings.
Trumbull promoted Cole’s talent among art patrons. He was quickly ushered into their social circle and by 1829 was touring Europe as a famous artist in his own right.
Cole favored the stormy aspects of nature, often illustrating awesome or fearsome landscapes – a technique not much used before his time. He frequently painted dangerous-looking panoramas with soaring mountain summits or towering waterfalls. His detailed works exhibited raw nature and entranced viewers in the scene before them.
Thomas Cole blazed a trail that would influence a generation of artists. Known as the first American artist to “picture the wilderness with the passion of a poet,” he is credited with founding the landscape art movement now recognized as the Hudson River School.
49¢ Hudson River School, issued to satisfy the first-class mail rate
Issue Date: August 21, 2014
City: Hartford, CT, at the American Philatelic Society Stamp Show
Quantity: 25 million
Category: Commemorative
Printed By: CCL Label
Printing Method: Photogravure
Perforations: Serpentine Die Cut 10¾
Self-Adhesive
Metropolitan Museum Of Art
On April 13, 1870, the Metropolitan Museum of Art was founded in New York City.
The history of “The Met” dates back to 1866 in Paris, France. At that time, John Jay (grandson of Chief Justice John Jay) and a group of Americans visiting Paris began talking about creating a “national institution and gallery of art” to help educate the American people.
Upon returning to the US, Jay, who was president of the Union League Club in New York, worked to gain support from civic leaders, businessmen, artists, art collectors, and philanthropists. Their efforts paid off, and on April 13, 1870, the New York Legislature granted their act of incorporation, “for the purpose of establishing and maintaining in said City a Museum and Library of Art, of encouraging and developing the Study of the Fine Arts, and the application of Art to manufacture and natural life, of advancing the general knowledge of kindred subjects, and to that end of furnishing popular instruction and recreations.”
Initially, the museum consisted of three private European collections totaling 174 paintings and one Roman stone sarcophagus. These included works by Hals, Van Dyck, Poussin, Tiepolo, and Guardi. American businessman John Taylor Johnson also provided artwork for the museum and served as its first president.
The Met first opened to the public on February 20, 1872, at 681 Fifth Avenue. However, its holdings were ever expanding, and this building couldn’t house the entire collection. So in 1873, the museum was moved to the Douglas Mansion at 128 West 14th Street. That would prove to be a temporary location as well, with the museum eventually moving to 1000 Fifth Avenue.
From 1879 to 1895, The Met hosted the Metropolitan Museum of Art Schools to educate people on fine arts. In 1893, another act pertaining to the museum was passed, requiring that the collections “shall be kept open and accessible to the public free of all charge throughout the year.”
Click here to visit the Met’s website, where you can see some of their collections and discover more history.
Less 
