Early Summer

Early Summer (1888) by William Trost Richards depicts a quiet wooded riverbank scene rather than the dramatic coastal subjects for which Richards is best known. The vertical composition unfolds in three planes: a grassy foreground where cattle graze at the water's edge, a calm river curving into the middle distance, and a dense canopy of summer trees closing off the background. Painted in muted greens, ochres, and soft grays, the picture favors tonal harmony over strong contrast, evoking the still, hazy warmth of its titular season rather than any dramatic incident. Richards retains the meticulous, itemized handling of foliage and grass associated with his earlier American Pre-Raphaelite training, even as the overall mood aligns with the more atmospheric Tonalism popular among American landscape painters in the 1880s. The result is an intimate, domesticated pastoral vision—closer to Barbizon-influenced Tonalism than to the sublime wilderness tradition of the earlier Hudson River Schoo