Thomas Cole – The Voyage of Life: Youth (1842)

Description

This work of art has been digitally enhanced without erasing signs of ageing for the sake of authenticity. Digital paintings are very popular right now as an affordable and stylish way to decorate and personalize your home and office.

Thomas Cole – The Voyage of Life: Youth (1842)

“The Voyage of Life is a series of four paintings created by the American artist Thomas Cole in 1840 and reproduced with minor alterations in 1842, representing an allegory of the four stages of human life. The paintings, Childhood, Youth, Manhood, and Old Age, depict a voyager who travels in a boat on a river through the mid-19th-century American wilderness. In each painting the voyager rides the boat on the River of Life accompanied by a guardian angel. The landscape, each reflecting one of the four seasons of the year, plays a major role in conveying the story.

With each installment the boat’s direction of travel is reversed from the previous picture. In childhood, the infant glides from a dark cave into a rich, green landscape. As a youth, the boy takes control of the boat and aims for a shining castle in the sky. In manhood, the adult relies on prayer and religious faith to sustain him through rough waters and a threatening landscape. Finally, the man becomes old and the angel guides him to heaven across the waters of eternity.

The second painting, Youth, shows the same lush, green landscape, but here the view widens as does the voyager’s life experience. Now the youth has firm hold of the tiller as the angel watches and waves from the shore, allowing him to take control. The subject’s youthful enthusiasm and energy is evident in his forward-thrusting pose and billowing clothes. In the distance, an ethereal citadel towers in the sky, a shimmering white beacon that represents the dreams and ambitions of humanity.

To the youth, the tranquil river appears to lead directly to the shimmering beacon, but at the far right of the painting one can just glimpse the river as it changes to become rough and difficult with the danger of rocks.

Cole comments on the landscape and the youth’s ambitions: “The scenery of the picture—its clear stream, its lofty trees, its towering mountains, its unbounded distance, and transparent atmosphere—figure forth the romantic beauty of youthful imaginings, when the mind elevates the mean and common into the magnificent, before experience teaches what is the Real.”

After purchase you will have access to a PDF document with a link to these files available for download: 5×7”, 7×10”, 8×12”, 10×14”, 14×20″, 16×24″, 24×36″ and A1.

All files are in JPG format and at 300 PPI/DPI resolution. Please note that colours on your screen may be slightly different from the actual print.

This is not a physical item therefore nothing will be shipped to you.

You can download the PDF file at checkout after the payment clears.

Since these are printable downloads, refunds cannot be issued. Should you have any issues or questions please contact us and we will be happy to assist you.

For personal use only. Please do not use our digital art files for commercial use or resale.

© NovemaDigital