'We know of nothing,' Henry James observed in 1875, 'that is a better proof of the essential impotence of criticism, in the last resort, than Mr. Church's pictures.' James wasn't (in this instance) being spiteful. He was trying to sort out a real problem: What did the work of America's preeminent painter actually mean' Serious art is supposed to mean something'that's a given'but really, what is there to say about Frederic Church's Valley of Santa Ysabel, New Granada' You see distant mountains, an effulgent sky reflected in placid water, lots of greenery, and tiny people not doing much besides establishing the scale of an adjacent palm. You can feel the stillness and weight of the air. 'Why not accept this lovely tropic scene as a very pretty picture,' James asked, 'and have done with it'' A century and a half later, we're still stumped. Church, whose 200th birthday rolled around in May, was America's first art star. He won accolades in England and a silver medal at the 1867...
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