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(American, 1801–1848)

Landscape with Figures: A Scene from "The Last of the Mohicans"

1826
Oil on panel
Image: 26 1/8 x 43 1/16 in. (66.4 x 109.4 cm)
Frame: 37 1/2 x 54 1/2 in. (95.3 x 138.4 cm)
Credit LineTerra Foundation for American Art, Daniel J. Terra Collection
Object number1993.2
SignedBottom center: T Cole/1826
Interpretation
Thomas Cole’s Landscape with Figures: A Scene from "The Last of the Mohicans" presents a vista of a densely forested, mountainous landscape seen from an elevated perspective. Rocky outcroppings, blasted trees, a waterfall, and smoke rising from a distant forest fire, as well as a tumultuous cloudscape, all contribute to the wildness of the prospect. The drama of nature seems both to dwarf and to complement the dramatic gestures of several diminutive figures scattered across the near ground yet inaccessible from the viewer’s standpoint. Although painted on a relatively small panel, the scene is larger than life in its romantic turmoil and emotional intensity.

The painting was one of two commissioned in 1826 by James Alexander Stevens of Hoboken, New Jersey. They were part of a series of twelve mahogany panels created to decorate the main cabin of Stevens's Hudson River steamboat the Albany. For the project, Cole was inspired by newly published novel The Last of the Mohicans, the second of the popular Leatherstocking Tales by James Fenimore Cooper. Landscape with Figures was the first of four works that the artist based on Cooper's text. Set during the French and Indian War (1755–63), the novel blends historical fact and romantic fiction as it recounts the efforts of sisters Alice and Cora Munro to join their father, a British commander, at Fort William Henry near Lake Champlain. Guided through the wilderness by Uncas (the last of the Mohicans), the frontiersman Hawkeye, and Major Duncan Heyward, their progress is thwarted by Magua, leader of a group of Hurons allied with the French against the British. Cole’s painting depicts the story’s climactic scene. On the far left, Heyward motions with his outstretched arm toward the center of the image. There Hawkeye aims his rifle at Magua, who hangs from the edge of a cliff. The white-clad Cora, having been kidnapped and brutalized by Magua, lies dying at Hawkeye's feet next to Uncas, who is killed while trying to save her.

In a young republic in which the fine arts were still widely regarded as either superfluous or a dangerously corrupting luxury, Cole saw the advantages of associating his painted landscape with a much-loved work of contemporary literature. Moreover, Cooper’s novels helped legitimize not only events from recent American history but the American wilderness as a vehicle for distinctly national cultural expression. In his earliest finished landscape paintings, produced only the year before he painted Landscape with Figures, Cole too endeavored to demonstrate that American nature, presented in all its untouched native wildness, could be the subject of high art.

While working on the painting, Cole visited the settings of Cooper's novel, including Lake George and Fort Ticonderoga, but his interpretation transcends topographical reportage. Landscape with Figures shares Cooper’s epic vision of the American experience in which the virtues of the "noble savage" and the uncouth pioneer—who, paradoxically, will save the "civilized" English colonists—are linked to the pristine landscape. In Cole’s interpretation, the grandeur of the wilderness overwhelms the narrative, reminding the viewer that there are greater forces in the universe than human conflict and desire.
ProvenanceThe artist
(commissioned by) James Alexander Stevens, late fall 1826
D. T. Vail
Christie's New York, New York, May 26, 1988, lot 25
Berry-Hill Galleries, Inc., New York, New York, 1988
Terra Foundation for the Arts Collection, Chicago, Illinois, February 1993
Exhibition History
The Gallery at Earle's, James Earle's frame shop, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 1827.

Exhibition of the Steamboat Albany Collection, main cabin steamboat, Albany, New York, April 1827–c.1843/1844.

Annual art exhibition (1858–1862), sponsored by the Troy Young Men's Association, Troy, New York, 1858 (as ); 1859 (as Death of Uncas).

Hudson River School Days, Berry-Hill Galleries, Inc., New York, New York (organizer). Venue: Berry-Hill Galleries, Inc., New York, New York, November 18, 1992–January 9, 1993.

Collection Cameo, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, March 1994.

Visions of a Nation: Exploring Identity through American Art, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizer). Venue: Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, August 10, 1996–January 12, 1997.

Selected Works from the Collections: Two Hundred Years of American Art, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizer). Venue: Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, April 12–August 27, 1997.

New Faces, New Places: Recent Additions to the Terra Foundation for the Arts Collection, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizer). Venue: Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, October 14–December 31, 2000.

Héroïque et le quotidien: les artistes américains, 1820–1920 (The Extraordinary and the Everyday: American Perspectives, 1820–1920), Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, France (organizer). Venue: Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, France, April 1–November 30, 2001. [exh. cat.]

American Classics: Selections from the Terra Foundation for the Arts, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizer). Venue: Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, January 26–September 1, 2002.

Collection Cameo, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, April 2002.

A Place on the Avenue: Terra Museum of American Art Celebrates 15 Years in Chicago, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizer). Venue: Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, November 16, 2002–February 16, 2003.

Deux collections en regard: oeuvres de la Terra Foundation for the Arts et du Detroit Institute of Arts (Side by Side: Works from the Terra Foundation for the Arts and the Detroit Institute of Arts), Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, France (organizer). Venue: Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, France, March 2–June 1, 2003. [exh. cat.]

A Narrative of American Art, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizer). Venue: Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, February 13–October 31, 2004.

Expanded Galleries of American Art with Loans from the Terra Foundation for American Art Collection, The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, April 15, 2005–January 2007.

Art in America: 300 Years of Innovation, Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation, New York, NY and Terra Foundation for American Art, Chicago, IL (organizers). Venues: National Art Art Museum of China, Beijing, China, February 9-April 5, 2007; Shanghai Museum, Shanghai, China, April 30-June 30, 2007; Shanghai Museum of Contemporary Art, Shanghai, China, April 30-June 30, 2007. (Shanghai presentations ran concurrently); The Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts, Moscow, Russia, July 23–September 9, 2007; Guggenheim Bilbao, Bilbao, Spain, October 15, 2007–April 27, 2008 (exhibited in Beijing and Shanghai; exhibited in Bilbao through January 13, 2008). [exh. cat.]

Galleries of American Art with Loans from the Terra Foundation for American Art Collection, The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, June 2008–December 2011.

Thomas Cole and the Birth of Landscape Painting in America, exhibition title at United States venues, American Encounters: Thomas Cole and the Narrative Landscape. Musée du Louvre, Paris; Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Bentonville, Arkansas; High Museum of Art, Atlanta; Terra Foundation for American Art (organizers). Venue: Musée du Louvre, January 14, 2012–April 16, 2012; Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, May 12–August 13, 2012; High Museum of Art, September 22, 2012–January 6, 2013. [exh. cat.]

Art Across America, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, California; Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Texas; National Museum of Korea, Seoul, South Korea; Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; Terra Foundation for American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizers). Venues: National Museum of Korea, Seoul, February 4– May 12, 2013; Daejeon Museum of Art, Daejeon, South Korea, June 7–September 1, 2013. [exh. cat.]

America: Painting a Nation, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, California; Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Texas; Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; Terra Foundation for American Art, Chicago, Illinois, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia (organizers). Venue: Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia, November 9, 2013–February 8, 2014. [exh. cat]

Galleries of American Art with Loans from the Terra Foundation for American Art Collection, The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, April 2014–May 2015.

Picturing the Americas: Landscape Painting from Tierra del Fuego to the Arctic, Terra Foundation for American Art, Chicago, Illinois, in partnership with the Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto, Canada and Pinacoteca de São Paulo, São Paulo, Brazil (organizers). Venues: Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto, Canada, June 20–September 7, 2015; Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Bentonville, Arkansas, November 6, 2015–January 18, 2016, Pinacoteca de São Paulo, São Paulo, Brazil, February 27–May 29, 2016. [exh. cat.]

Continental Shift: Nineteenth Century American and Australian Landscape Painting, Art Gallery of Western Australia, Perth, Australia and Terra Foundation for American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizers). Venue: Art Gallery of Western Australia, July 30, 2016–February 5, 2017. [exh. cat.]

Not as the Songs of other Lands: 19th century Australian and American Landscape Painting, Ian Potter Museum of Art, Melbourne, Australia and Terra Foundation for American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizers). Venue: Ian Potter Museum of Art, March 14–June 11, 2017.

Galleries of American Art with Loans from the Terra Foundation for American Art Collection, The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, September 2017–present.

Published References
Morse, Samuel F. B. "Academies of Arts: A Discourse." Delivered on Thursday, May 3, 1827, in the Chapel of Columbia College, before the National Academy of Design on its Anniversary. Addendum, p. 53.

Nichols, Authur St. Clair, "Notes and Remarks" (July 1827), typescript in "Hudson River" vertical file, Print Room Archives, Museum of the City of New York.

Durand, Asher B. "To the Crayon." Crayon 4 (June 1857): 181. Text p. 181.

Christie’s, New York, New York. Sale BARBRA-6610, “Important American Paintings, Drawings, and Sculpture of the 19th and 20th Centuries,” May 26, 1988): lot 25. Text p. 32 (as Last of the Mohicans); ill. p. 33, lot. 25 (color).

American Paintings V 1988. New York: Berry-Hill Galleries, Inc., 1988. Text p. 14; ill. p. 15 (black & white).

Art & Auction (October 1988): 3. Ill. cover, detail (color), p. 3 (color).

Dobrzynski, Judith H. "The Investment Spectrum/The Art Market: Art Collectors May Want To Stay Close To Home." Business Week (December 26, 1988): 184-85. Ill.

Parry, Ellwood C., III. International Dictionary of Art and Artists, Vol. 2. Chicago, Illinois: St James Press, 1990. Ill. pp. 740–41.

Powell, Earl A. Thomas Cole. New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc., 1990. Ill. p. 28 (color).

Parry, Ellwood C., III, "La Montague dans L'Imaginaire de Thomas Cole (Mountains in Thomas Cole's Imagination)." Actes du 116e congrés National des Societes Savantes. Paris, France: Editions du C. T. H. S., 1991. Text pp. 339, 415; ill. p. 179, fig. 4-6.

"Hudson River Paintings." AMERICANA (February 1993): 74. Text p. 74; ill. p. 74 (as The Last of the Mohicans).

Landscape with Figures: A Scene from "The Last of the Mohicans", Thomas Cole. Collection Cameo sheet, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, March 1994. lll. (black & white).

Parry, Ellwood C., III. "Cooper, Cole and the Last of the Mohicans." Papers in Art History: Art and the Native American. College Park, Pennsylvania: Pennsylvania State University, 1996.

Beckett, Sister Wendy. Sister Wendy's American Masterpieces. New York: Doris Kindersley Publishing, Inc., 2000. Text pp. 20–21; ill. pp. 20-21 (color).

Myers, Kenneth John. "Art and Commerce in Jacksonian America: The Steamboat Albany Collection." Art Bulletin 82, no. 3 (September 2000): 503–28. Text pp. 503, 510, 512, 519, 522, 526n50, 528n81; ill. p. 514, fig. 16 (black & white).

Cartwright, Derrick R. The Extraordinary and the Everyday: American Perspectives, 1820–1920. (exh. cat., Musée d'Art Américain Giverny). Chicago, Illinois: Terra Foundation for the Arts, 2001. Text p. 17, 22 (checklist); ill. p. 26 (color).

Cartwright, Derrick R. L'Héroïque et le quotidian: les artistes américains, 1820–1920. (exh. cat., Musée d'Art Américain Giverny). Chicago, Illinois: Terra Foundation for the Arts, 2001. Text p. 17, 22 (checklist); ill. p. 26 (color).

Thielmans, Veerle. “L’Amérique: Terre d’observation, pays reve.” In MAAG Sources: Milbert, Lesueur, Tocqueville. Le Voyage en Amérique, 1815–1845, 9-32; 56-62. Giverny: Musée d’Art Américan Giverny, 2001. Ill. pp. 8-9 (detail); ill. p. 18, fig. 7 (color).

Parry, Ellwood C., III. "Cooper, Cole, and The Last of the Mohicans." In Mary Louise Krumrine and Susan Clare Scott, eds.,Art and the Native American: Perceptions, Reality, and Influences, Volume X, Papers in Art History from The Pennsylvania State University. University Park, Pennsylvania: The Pennsylvania State University, 2001: 146–95. Text pp. 148, 153–156, ; ill. pp. 146, 179, fig. 4–7 (color).

Katz, Roberta Gray. Landscape with Figures: A Scene from "The Last of the Mohicans", Thomas Cole. Collection Cameo sheet, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, April 2002. Ill. (color).

Bourguignon, Katherine M. and Elizabeth Kennedy. An American Point of View: The Daniel J. Terra Collection. Chicago, Illinois: Terra Foundation for the Arts, 2002. Text pp. 54, 193; ill. pp. 5 (color), 55 (color), 193 (black & white).

Bourguignon, Katherine M. and Elizabeth Kennedy. Un regard transatlantique. La collection d'art américain de Daniel J. Terra. Chicago, Illinois: Terra Foundation for the Arts, 2002. Text pp. 54, 193; ill. pp. 5 (color), 55 (color), 193 (black & white).

Side by Side: Works from the Terra Foundation for the Arts and the Detroit Institute of Arts. (exh. cat., Musée d'Art Américain Giverny). Chicago, Illinois: Terra Foundation for the Arts, 2003. Text p. 7; ill. p. 6 (color).

Deux collections en regard: oeuvres de la Terra Foundation for the Arts et du Detroit Institute of Arts. (exh. cat., Musée d'Art Américain Giverny). Chicago, Illinois: Terra Foundation for the Arts, 2003. Text p. 7; ill. p. 6 (color).

Erkkila, Betsy. Mixed Bloods and Other Crosses: Rethinking American Literature from the Revolution to the Culture Wars. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2005. Text pp. 18–19. Ill. cover (color detail); fig. 3, p. 19 (black & white).

Davidson, Susan, ed. Art in America: 300 Years of Innovation. (exh. cat., National Museum of China, Beijing; Shanghai Museum). New York, NY: Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation; Chicago, IL: Terra Foundation for American Art, 2007. Text p. 103; ill. p. 109 (color).

Davidson, Susan, ed. Art in America: 300 Years of Innovation. (exh. cat., National Museum of China, Beijing; Shanghai Museum). New York, NY: Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation; Chicago, IL: Terra Foundation for American Art, 2007. (Chinese edition). Text p. 103; ill. p. 109 (color).

Davidson, Susan, ed. Art in the USA: 300 años de innovación. (exh. cat., Guggenheim Museum Bilbao, Bilbao, Spain). New York, NY: Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation; Chicago, IL: Terra Foundation for American Art, 2007. (Spanish edition). ill. p. 74 (color).

Brownlee, Peter John. Manifest Destiny / Manifest Responsibility: Environmentalism and the Art of the American Landscape. (exh. cat., Loyola University Museum of Art, Chicago, Illinois). Chicago, Illinois: Terra Foundation for American Art and Loyola University Museum of Art, 2008. Text p. 13; ill. p. 14 (color).

Faroult, Guillaume. Thomas Cole: The Cross in the Wilderness. (exh. cat., Musée du Louvre). Paris, France: Musée du Louvre, 2011. Text pp. 22–23; ill. p. 41 (color).

Balestieri, James. "Artist in the Wilderness: Influence and inspiration in the art of Thomas Cole." American Fine Art Magazine (May/June 2012): 102–05. Text p. 104; ill. p. 104 (color).

Art Across America. (exh. cat., National Museum of Korea, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Philadelphia Museum of Art and the Terra Foundation for American Art). Seoul, South Korea: National Museum of Korea, 2013. Text pp. 21, 33, 81; ill. p. 21, fig. 3 (color); p. 33, fig. 3 (color), p. 80 (color).

America: Painting a Nation. (exh. cat., Art Gallery of New South Wales, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, National Museum of Korea, Philadelphia Museum of Art and the Terra Foundation for American Art). Sydney, Australia: Art Gallery of New South Wales, 2013. Text p. 60; ill. p. 61, cat. no. 7 (color).

Brownlee, Peter John, Sarah Burns, Diane Dillon, Daniel Greene, and Scott Manning Stevens. Home Front: Daily Life in the Civil War North. (exh. cat., Terra Foundation for American Art and Newberry Library). Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2013. Text p. 54.

Brownlee, Peter John, Valéria Piccoli, and Georgiana Uhlyarik, eds. Picturing the Americas: Landscape Painting from Tierra del Fuego to the Arctic. (exh. cat., Art Gallery of Ontario, Pinacoteca do Estado de São Paulo and the Terra Foundation for American Art). Toronto, Ontario: Art Gallery of Ontario in association with Yale University Press, New Haven, Connecticut, 2015. Text pp. 120–121; ill. fig. 1, p. 120 (color).

Brownlee, Peter John, Valéria Piccoli, and Georgiana Uhlyarik, eds. Paisaje en las Américas: Pinturas desde la Tierra del Fuego al Artico. (exh. cat., Art Gallery of Ontario, Pinacoteca do Estado de São Paulo and the Terra Foundation for American Art). Toronto, Ontario: Art Gallery of Ontario in association with Yale University Press, New Haven, Connecticut, 2015. Text pp. 120–121; ill. p. 120, fig. 1 (color).

Brownlee, Peter John, Valéria Piccoli, and Georgiana Uhlyarik, eds. Paisagem nas Américas: Pinturas da Terra do Fogo ao Artico. (exh. cat., Art Gallery of Ontario, Pinacoteca do Estado de São Paulo and the Terra Foundation for American Art). Toronto, Ontario: Art Gallery of Ontario in association with Yale University Press, New Haven, Connecticut, 2015. Text pp. 120–121; ill. p. 120, fig. 1 (color).

Brownlee, Peter John, Valéria Piccoli, and Georgiana Uhlyarik. “New Worlds, New Art: Landscape painting in all the Americas, a touring exhibition and an inquiry.” The Magazine Antiques 182, no. 6 (November/December 2015): 72–81. Text pp. 77–78; ill. p. 79, fig. 11 (color).

Brenes, Ietza Azucena Zepeda. Review of Picturing the Americas: Landscape Painting from Tierra Del Fuego to the Arctic, by Peter John Brownlee, Valeria Piccoli, and Georgiana Uhlyarik (eds.). Journal für Kunstgeschichte 20, no. 2 (February 2016): 166–179. Text p. 179.

Desmarais, Marey-Dailey and Thomas Brent Smith, eds., Once Upon a time…The Western: A New frontier in Art and Film. (exh. cat. Denver Art museum and the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts). Denver: Denver Art Museum; Montreal: Montreal Museum of Art; Milan: Five Continents editions, 2017. Distributed by Harry N. Abrams, Inc. and Yale University Press. Text p. 35, 284, ill. p. 34 (color).

Bourguignon, Katherine M., and Peter John Brownlee, eds. Conversations with the Collection: A Terra Foundation Collection Handbook. Chicago: Terra Foundation for American Art, 2018. Text pp. 43–45, 49, 52, 53; fig. 1, p. 44; ill. p. 52, detail pp. 54-55 (color).

There are no additional artworks by this artist in the collection.