Albert Pinkham Ryder...The Moon was as Big as a Grapefruit!

" What the artist must render is a living moment somehow, a living moment actually in action or an inward experience."
Joseph Campbell , "The Hero's Journey"

 Lord Ullin's Daughter
Albert Pinkham Ryder
Smithsonian American Art Museum

 Albert Pinkham Ryder...The Moon was as Big as a Grapefruit!


By Federico Correa 

Last night...once again.... the moon was as big as a grapefruit. It was bright and yellow-white. It was a  friendly moon peering through the evening  mist lighting the country side.     It was a familiar Albert Pinkham Ryder painting.

 Poetry is defined as " the art of rhythmical composition, written or spoken, for exciting pleasure by beautiful, imaginative, or elevated thoughts". Ryder's  painted image can be defined as   poetry in paint . His   fecund thickly layered  painted surface  is ladened  with drama, allegory, imagination and human emotion. 


Born in 1847, Ryder was an American painter. Described as a "loner"...a "recluse"...he was a Romantic painter as was his chosen subject matter.  His most celebrated  work  is  somber in tone and style. Driven by an itntense and  fertile imagination, Ryder recreated great themes into highly personal visions.  Turbulent  seascapes and   landscapes; literary  and  biblical topics predominated his late work. 

The Fying Dutchman
Albert Pinkham Ryder
Smithsonian American Art Museum

Plainly speaking, Ryder's images   arouse curiosity .   They   quietly confront    the viewer to  stop and take note .  On a very primal or fundamental level, perhaps  it is the  drama... the juxtaposition  of   light and dark  .....the constant push and pull  between the foreboding  versus hope and security that attracts. Odlin Redon comes to mind.

Moon Light
Albert Pinkham Ryder
Smithsonian American Art Museum

On a personal level,  I find Ryder's painted "inward experiences"  mysterious ..a bit insular...and deeply intimate.    I sense an abundance of sadness, perhaps sorrow emanating from much of his work. For years,  I  hesitated  to  acknowledge .. or consider... or explain  my  subtle  attraction to his   most beautiful  imagery.  I  understand now. His  painted  feelings..his consciousness...are companion. I am in sympathy.   Its about the quiet. Its  about the  solitude...the loneliness... and  the enduring pain that comes with loss and separation that resonates from much of his work. Here lies the universality ...the pathos... that   touches the receptive soul .  

Lastly,  much like  Philip Guston , Grace Hartigan,  Chiam Soutine and Francisco Goya among others,  Ryder was not a "perfectionist painter". Ryder  died in  1917.

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A wonderful source  on   Albert Pinkham Ryder is found on The Brooklyn Rail   , specifically:

Notes on Albert Pinkham Ryder by Bill Jensen.  Here Jensen, a painter,  speaks eloquently and passionately  about the artist. I strongly suggest the read.

Also for more information on Albert Pinkham Ryder  go to
Answers.com Albert Pinkham Ryder