Landscape painting by its very nature is evidence of the complex interaction between humans and the land around them. This exhibition, drawn entirely from the AMAM’s collection, highlights works by artists as diverse as Alexander Calder, Giorgio de Chirico, Arshile Gorky, James McDougal Hart, Piet Mondrian and Claude Monet, among others, who have taken up the subjects of the natural world and changing notions of its beauty, resources, and man’s place within it.

Henri-Edmond Cross’s The Return of the Fisherman, for example, is the result of Cross’s intense observations of the Mediterranean coastline at the small village of Saint-Clair, where he lived. With vibrant colors and a pointillist technique, he depicted the path to the beach, with the rocks known as “Les Baleines” (The Whales) visible in the surf and a fisherman in the foreground returning from a day’s work. Cross’s combination of topographical accuracy, abstracted forms and brilliant tonalities is evidence of his attempt to resolve the tension between the use of specific natural motifs and his own inner vision.

Organized by Andria Derstine, curator of Western art