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  • Falls of the Kaaterskill
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  • The Clove, Catskills
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  • The Course of Empire: The Savage State
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  • The Course of Empire: The Arcadian or Pastoral State
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  • The Course of Empire: The Consummation of Empire
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  • The Course of Empire: Destruction
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  • The Course of Empire: Desolation
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  • View from Mount Holyoke, Northampton, Massachusetts, After A Thunderstorm (The Oxbow)
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  • View on the Catskill, Early Autumn
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  • The Voyage of Life: Childhood (First Set)
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  • The Voyage of Life: Youth (First Set)
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  • The Voyage of Life: Manhood (First Set)
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  • The Voyage of Life: Old Age (First Set)
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  • The Architect's Dream
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  • Mount Etna From Taormina, Sicily
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  • A View of the Two Lakes and Mountain House, Catskill Mountains, Morning
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  • Kindred Spirits

The Voyage of Life: Manhood (First Set)

Thomas Cole. Oil on canvas, 1840, 52 x 78 in. Munson-Williams-Proctor Arts Institute, Utica, NY, 55.107.

About the Series:

The Voyage of Life

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Process

Cole experimented with many different compositions for the third painting of the series. In the earliest study, illustrated here, Cole intended for the painting to be a coastal scene, with stormy waves crashing against a cliff where the angel is perched. The Voyager clings for his life to the ship. In the second oil study, the waves are less intense, and the Voyager is seated, not standing, in the boat. The threatening demons appear for the first time in this work. The final oil study shows Cole working solely with the landscape. Here the design is closest to the final composition: the river turns into a waterfall at the right, and waves crash into a cliff with a broken tree. 1 

Works

1. Thomas Cole, <cite>Study for The Voyage of Life: Manhood</cite>, oil on wooden panel, c. 1837-39, 12 x 13 5/8 in. Albany Institute of History and Art. View in Virtual Gallery

2. Thomas Cole, <cite>Compositional Sketch for The Voyage of Life: Manhood</cite>, oil on wooden panel, c. 1840, 11 x 16 &frac34; in. Museum of Art, Munson-Williams-Proctor Arts Institute. View in Virtual Gallery

3. Thomas Cole, <cite>The Voyage of Life: Manhood (First Set)</cite>, oil on canvas, 1840, 52 x 78 in. Munson-Williams-Proctor Arts Institute, Utica, NY, 55.107.

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