Artwork
View of New York from New Jersey
View of New York from New Jersey is an oil painting by the Hudson River School artist Asher Brown Durand. It dates from 1850 and is held in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
About this work
A wide river, low hills, and a smoky skyline: New York in 1850, seen from across the water in New Jersey. Durand painted it before skyscrapers, the tiny sailboats and haze leaving the city small and quiet. Thin oil layers catch the soft light. Oil on canvas.
Subject & Meaning
The painting depicts a panoramic view of New York City as seen from across the Hudson River in New Jersey.
The painting depicts a panoramic view of New York City as seen from across the Hudson River in New Jersey. The composition foregrounds the river’s expanse, framed by naturalistic foliage and riverbank details, while the distant skyline anchors the scene with identifiable architectural landmarks of mid-nineteenth-century New York. The work emphasizes the expansive reach of the American landscape and the emerging urban center, merging topographical accuracy with Romantic ideals of nature and progress.
The river functions both as a physical divider and a connective element, symbolizing the interplay between wilderness and civilization that defined antebellum American identity.
Technique & Style
View of New York from New Jersey is an oil-on-canvas landscape painting created in 1850. The work measures 38.1 cm in height and 68.8 cm in width, presenting a river scene typical of the genre. Executed with oil paint on a canvas support, the piece reflects the formal qualities of mid-19th-century American landscape art.
Although the Metropolitan Museum of Art currently houses the painting in its American Wing, the work was formerly attributed to Asher Brown Durand. The composition focuses on the depiction of a river and surrounding landscape, adhering to the stylistic conventions of the era while maintaining the physical integrity expected of a canvas painting from this period.
History & Provenance
View of New York from New Jersey is housed in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, where it is part of The American Wing collection. The painting, executed by Asher Brown Durand in 1850, is recorded in the museum’s catalog as an oil on canvas measuring 38.1 × 68.8 cm. The work is classified as a landscape and is listed under the museum’s landscape painting holdings. No specific accession or inventory number is cited in the available documentation, and the sources do not detail any exhibition history for the piece.
Context
The painting View of New York from New Jersey (1850) is an oil on canvas landscape by Asher Brown Durand, held in the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s American Wing collection. It portrays a river scene and is classified as a landscape painting, measuring 38.1 cm in height by 68.8 cm in width. As part of the museum’s 19th‑century American paintings assemblage, the work exemplifies the era’s focus on naturalistic representation of the American environment and reflects Durand’s transition from engraving to oil during his early mature period.
Overview
Asher Brown Durand's View of New York from New Jersey, an oil on canvas created around 1850, offers a broad landscape perspective. The painting depicts the emerging New York City skyline as observed from across the river in New Jersey. This work exemplifies a mid-19th-century artistic approach to capturing both the natural environment and early urban expansion within the American landscape tradition.
Artist & collection
Artist
Asher Brown Durand spent his life in the rolling hills of New Jersey, where the forests and farmland shaped his quiet, deliberate way of seeing.
- Landskab ved Arresø
Landskab ved Arresø
Udsigt over Skanderborg fra Edelsborgmark
Nordsjællandsk landskab. I baggrunden den svenske kyst
Nordsjællandsk landskab. I baggrunden den svenske kyst
Udsigt over Skanderborg fra Edelsborgmark
Parti i nærheden af Nøddebo
Prospekt fra Dronninggård over Furesøen. I forgrunden øen Chevallier med det kinesiske lysthus
Prospekt fra Dronninggård over Furesøen. I forgrunden øen Chevallier med det kinesiske lysthus
Flodlandskab
Landschaft
Wooded Landscape with a River