View from Mount Holyoke, Northampton, Massachusetts, after a Thunderstorm—The Oxbow

Fascinated by the winding Connecticut River, Cole made the U-shaped bend known as the “Oxbow” the subject of this painting. Beyond the tempestuous storm clouds and blasted tree lies a patchwork of farmland, sunlight illuminating private properties full of crops, hay bales, and sheep. Cole’s composition emphasizes the encroachment of Euro-American settlement into a supposed untamed “wilderness.” At the lower center, the artist depicted himself pausing from a sketch and gazing at the viewer.

“I think that [Cole] is calling out the fact that our way of developing—our way of improving the land or making it profitable—was pushing nature out, Indigenous people out.” Xiye Bastida, climate activist, Audioguide 4026