The slim, vertical nature of the birch tree appealed to Gustav Klimt, who captured dense forests which filled the entire canvas. Much would depend on the trees available around each artist, though some would travel around in order to find landscapes that best suited their artistic style.
The Fascination of Trees in Art
I hope you enjoy our current online exhibition “Trees”. There is something so special about trees. They outlive us humans by hundreds of years and stand for continuity, security, strength, stability, community, wisdom and generosity. Artist’s are drawn like magpies to their symbolism, as well as their complex structure; their leaves and branches offer a challenge. Trees are so generous, giving us colour with the seasons, oxygen, shade, wood, paper, fuel. So intwined in our mythology are they that we all have a favourite tree or memory from childhood.
Trees have become increasingly meaningful in our society as their premature destruction in the rainforests seems to have led to climate change which affects us all. Not only that but a number of diseases have threatened such familiar favourites as the Elm and in recent years the Ash and Horse Chestnut. Faced with their extinction, we have a heightened awareness of their importance and respect for them as a species and this is reflected in art.
Artist’s are drawn like magpies to their symbolism
In the mid 18th Century, part of the new garden ideal, popularised by William Kent, was to plant groves of trees to naturalise the British landscape. Around this time many unusual specimens were brought from the four corners of the globe to English Country houses and remain here to this day such as Lebanon Cedars. Including trees in your portrait could therefore symbolise your wealth and prosperity, for example in this portrait by Gainsborough
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Thomas Gainsborough ‘Mr and Mrs Robert Andrews’, Painted c. 1748-1750
In the 19 th Century, the nordic painter Carl Caspar Friedrich, whose romantic interpretation of the landscape was an antidote to the Industrial revolution, was a big influence on British art. His ‘Tree of Crows’ illustrated, sees an oak bending in desperation in the the wind as though it had character. Old folk songs like ‘The Ash Grove’ which were hugely popular in the 19th century, affirm the romanticism of trees at this time.
Caspar David Friedrich ‘The Tree of Crows’, oil on canvas, 1822, Musée du Louvre, Paris, Photo credit: Erin Kathleen
Another painting which has always stayed with me is ‘The Long Engagement’ by pre-raphaelite Arthur Hughes from the mid 19th century. The meeting of the affiancés should be the main subject but it is the tree which stands out. Their favourite tree, painted in incredible detail, with their names carved in the bark, but overgrown with ivy and moss has become the symbol of ‘The Long Engagement’ more than the look of disappointment on their faces.
Arthur Hughes, The Long Engagement, oil on canvas, 1854-59, Birmingham Art Gallery
Photo credit: “Arthur Hughes, ‘The Long Engagement'” by sofi01 is licensed under CC BY-NC 2.0
The 20th century was dominated by war, revolt and modernism. WW1 was a huge shock after the politeness of the cultivated Edwardian era. The war artist Paul Nash poignant painting of 1917 ‘We are Making a New World’, with his vision of tree stumps without a leaf or branch on them, brought home the utter destruction of war in a stark and graphic way. The conquering of machinery over nature is shown as a bleak new world.
Photo credit: “Paul Nash” by Emilio Quintana Pareja is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0
‘The vision of tree stumps without a leaf or branch on them, brought home the utter destruction of war’
In the same year Gustav Klimt painted ‘Four Trees’, 1917, showing the four seasons in one go – a rather more optimistic, manipulated view of the world, but one which is much more palatable.
It is only towards the end of the 20th century that we see trees depicted in major works of contemporary art, largely in sculpture.
Hockney’s return to England after a long period in California in the late 1990s led to an appreciation of Copses in his native Yorkshire, such as Woldgate Woods, and eventually a series of large oil paintings. These colourful monumental works were exhibited at the Royal Academy in 2012. They proved enormously popular amongst an increasingly perverse, shocking, and monotone field of contemporary art.
Photo credit: “Viewing Hockney” by HannahWebb
Another artist, who quietly took the art world by storm in the late 20th century is Scottish artist Andy Goldsworthy. Many of his beautiful ephermeral instalation sculptures of the natural world only exist now in photographs. I recommend his book ‘Time’ published in 2000 by Thames and Hudson. He used natural patterns of leaves or natural dyes to mark and sculpt tree roots and photographed their natural degeneration over time.
Photo credit: Andy Goldsworthy Storm King Wall Storm King Art Center NY 2659″ by bobistraveling i
I was lucky enough to attend the unveiling of this sculpture by Bill Woodrow in 2000 for the fourth plinth in Trafalgar square. Called ‘Regardless of History’ it depicts a tree engulfing a giant book and the head of a man. It makes us think about wisdom and the growth of human knowledge when dwarfed by nature and the supremacy of nature over human achievements.
Photo credit: “Bill Woodrow – Regardless of History” by Cass Sculpture Foundation is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0
In more recent times Ai Wei Wei bolted together and reassembled different tree parts which he bought from markets in China to form his installation ‘Trees’. Some of you would have seen this in the courtyard of the Royal Accademy, London in 2015. The different tree parts represent an amalgamation, from different cultures within China, coming together to form a whole.
Photo credit: “royal academy: tree” by stusmith_uk is licensed under CC BY-ND 2.0
It makes us think about the supremacy of nature over human achievements.
What of recent paintings? I must mention Peter Doig, whose mix of post-impressionism and romanticism has led his paintings to be some of the most expensive sold at auction by a living artist. He often uses trees as a magical backdrop or as a screen to spy on the modern, man made world.
Artists have focussed on the symbolism of trees for political and environmental causes but also for their colour, wildness and beauty. The subject of trees has also been a peg on which an artist can hang ideas of time passing and hope for the future.
In our current exhibition of Trees we are delighted to have paintings by Conrad Clarke, whose detailed and other worldly paintings of trees are full of colour and tone. Conrad is currently Jackson’s Art Prize ‘Best Emerging Artist 2020’
CONRAD CLARKE CC049 Fall, oil on canvas, 50 x 50cm £920
A wonderful painting of a Winter Oak by Jane Overbury with a very opalescent sky.
JANE OVERBURY JO016 Winter Oak (Opalescence), oil on canvas, 90 x 90cm £950
The ever popular paintings of Janet James, whose mark making and use of colour give a very contemporary look.
JANET JAMES JJ108 Deeside Birches 1, oil on panel, 61 x 61cm £850
Wonderful glass by Helen Slater Stokes.
HELEN SLATER STOKES HS014e Winter Branches, light turquoise & sepia mini cast, 9×8 £78
Also included are the oil paintings of John Henry, whose trees provide structure and literal roots for an urban landscape.
JOHN HENRY JWH051 London Life, The Mall oil on board, 60×60 £750
There will also be work by other gallery artists included.
We are delighted to have guest artists, Ange Mullen Bryan and Mike Ibbotson who have kindly contributed to this exhibition:
Ange’s paintings have a distinctly nordic feel and evoke the trees as fairytale characters.
ANGE MULLEN BRYAN AMB002 Era, oil on canvas, 77 x 115cm £2,400
Mike’s instinctive feel for the landscape is combined with his architectural drawing skills. His paintings of pollarded willows capture the essence of the Cotswolds in a modern way.
MIKE IBBOTSON MI002 Three willows, acrylic on canvas, 30 x 40cm
The exhibition ‘Trees’ will go online at noon on Tuesday 1 September and all works will be available to view and to buy, either online or by appointment. We hope you enjoy this online exhibition.
A List of Famous Tree Paintings and the Artists behind them
We have collated below a full list of famous paintings which feature trees in one guise or another. We have aimed to feature a variety of artists and styles, in order to indicate the many varied ways in which this popular plant has been used in art over the past few centuries.
The Tree of Life by Gustav Klimt
This stunning artwork features Gustav Klimt’s use of gold leaf paint and captures swirling branches in a beautiful painting. It was a section of a mural known as the Stocklet Frieze but is treated by some as an independent work in its own right.
Notice in Tree of Life of how the artist flattens the perspective and is not interested in depicting reality, even though some of Klimt’s other tree paintings are much more realistic. He was a versatile artist who sat within the Vienna Secession movement, an offshoot of the charming Art Nouveau era.
The Tree of Life by Gustav Klimt
Birch Forest by Gustav Klimt
Birch Forest captures the tall narrow nature of these beautiful trees, with Klimt combining slimmer, younger trees alongside thicker, mature plants in the same composition. Notice how the artist composes this piece, cropping a seemingly random section of a forest, without anything close by to bring perspective.
One could almost term this a pattern, with no clear start or end point. Klimt produced many tree paintings in this manner, clearly appreciating these long, thin trees and how they contrasted with the fallen leaves that lay below.
Birch Forest by Gustav Klimt
The Oak Tree in the Snow by Caspar David Friedrich
Friedrich was a highly gifted Romanticism artist who focused on landscapes. Many of his artworks were sombre, and in this example he chose to capture a decaying tree, drawing on negative symbolism. The tree is unhealthy, suffering in the cold, just as humans might do without the necessary shelter.
Friedrich was one of the finest German painters, and also added human figures into some of his landscape scenes to create a sense of size and perspective. He covered trees many times, and was rare in devoting entire artworks to a single tree, particularly considering their poor condition, in some cases.
The Oak Tree in the Snow by Caspar David Friedrich
Cross in the Mountains by Caspar David Friedrich
Friedrich uses trees to lead the eye in this example, as they line a hill which converged in the centre of the painting. The artist regularly used crosses within his scene, to provide symbolic meaning for religion, without the need to add humanity into each artwork.
Cross in the Mountains makes use of a darkened tone which creates a particular mood, whilst also allowing the bright beams of light from the background to contrast strongly. This piece remains amongst his best known works, and perfectly captures the essence of this painter.
Cross in the Mountains – Tree Painting
Chalk Cliffs on Rugen by Caspar David Friedrich
Chalk Cliffs on Rugen features a careful composition, in which the artist uses over hanging branches to form something of a window, through which we can observe the scenery in the distance. It is almost akin to a framed artwork, and very precisely leads the viewer’s eyes.
As a further point of interest, several figures are added in the foreground, and we are essentially viewing what they are seeing at the same time, allowing us to get into their minds just for a short moment. The artist continued this in his Wanderer painting.
Chalk Cliffs on Rugen – Tree Painting
The Mulberry Tree by Vincent van Gogh
Mulberry Tree is a bright and expressive tree painting, with golden branches clashing against the bright blue sky that lies in the background. A simple stretch of blue signifies the shadow cast by the tree, though little shade is needed in this incredibly warm artwork.
The branches of the tree are swirling, connecting to the expressive nature of Van Gogh’s work. Some outlines are added in black paint in order to help discern the edges of the plant, with vertical strokes used for the dark brown trunk.
The Mulberry Tree by Vincent van Gogh
The Olive Trees by Vincent van Gogh
The swirling brilliance of Van Gogh returns again in Olive Trees. These short plants only reach up to the mid-way point of the painting and above we find swirling clouds, a signature of the artist, plus also dark blue tones that represent a rocky hillside in the distance.
The expressive nature of the artist allows the entire composition to merge together into a dream-like form, representing the original image only loosely. Van Gogh mastered trees and made them exciting by incorporating emotion into each depiction.
The Olive Trees by Vincent van Gogh
The Starry Night by Vincent van Gogh
Van Gogh used the cypress tree within his classic artwork, Starry Night. It was to symbolise immortality, but was also useful in providing a vertical structure in the foreground. It relation to the small town behind, the tree towers into the air.
Vincent uses vertical strokes of paint, darkened, for the main tree. In the distance we find curved, circular formations which are presumably smaller trees which are placed around the town to break up the architecture of the homes. Together they produce something of a sea wave appearance.
The Starry Night by Vincent van Gogh
Gray Tree by Piet Mondrian
Piet Mondrian started to develop a less-traditional artistic style through a series of tree paintings. He would reduce these beautiful plants down to a series of strokes of paint, leaving individual brushstrokes still visible on the canvas. Gray Tree is perhaps the best of these, and gives an unforgettable atmosphere.
The artist also produced a series of landscape paintings with an abstract feel whilst travelling on local islands in the Netherlands. He loved the fresh sea air, and the complete tranquility of these quiet, almost uninhabited locations.
Gray Tree by Piet Mondrian
Evening, Red Tree by Piet Mondrian
Evening, Red Tree is a further addition to the tree series by Mondrian, adding some bright colors which deliver a completely different mood to this piece. Individuals touches of paint are still visible, and despite the darkened branches, its trunk is bright, making the tree look relatively healthy.
In the very background, perhaps a small bridge is visible. His tree series was not well known during Mondrian’s lifetime, but in recent years has proven to be a popular section of his oeuvre, and it also represents the start of his transition towards abstraction.
Evening, Red Tree
Four Trees by Egon Schiele
Perhaps the finest tree painting of them all, Egon Schiele’s Four Trees is a breathtaking Expressionist artwork. The use of color is key here, as well as the primitive manner in which the elements are delivered, almost recreating a child painting at school for the first time.
Schiele was a unique and truly gifted painter who helped to modernise techniques and incorporate emotion into art. He lines the trees up in a horizontal row, with a flat perspective almost akin to the art of the Middle Ages, though all of these tweaks are entirely intended, as Schiele could paint in a technically correct manner, if he chose to.
Four Trees by Egon Schiele
Almond Blossom by Vincent van Gogh
One of Van Gogh’s finest paintings, this is one of a series devoted to almond trees, which he would have come across when living in France in the latter part of his life. The colors are particularly pleasant, and in this set he gets close in on the topic, where most of his tree paintings feature them as part of a wider landscape.
Almond Blossoms by Vincent van Gogh
Wheat Field with Cypresses by Vincent van Gogh
Wheat Field with Cypresses
The Hay Wain by John Constable
The British countryside is perfectly summarised by this famous John Constable painting known as The Hay Wain. Trees form a significant part of the landscape, and this artwork has something of a timeless quality to it. He specialised in landscape art and devoted his time to the county of Suffolk, rarely travelling beyond its boundaries.
The Hay Wain by John Constable
Mr and Mrs Andrews by Thomas Gainsborough
This addition may come as a surprise, but the thick trunk sitting behind the couple serves an important purpose within this famous Gainsborough painting. He could combine landscape art with portraiture, and achieved a number of impressive commissions because of his impressive technical skill that had been honed over a long period of study and practice.
British art has a history of covering its green and pleasant landscape. Trees have been a major part of that, with thick, strong trees decorating many parts of this beautiful island. Constable, Turner and Gainsborough have all incorporated landscape elements into their work, and even the Pre-Raphaelites would find ways to include it alongside their stunning figurative portraits, combined with themes of mythology and British literature, including poetry most significantly.
Mr and Mrs Andrews by Thomas Gainsborough
A Historical Journey: Tracing the Evolution of Tree Paintings
Trees have been used within art for many centuries, dating back to Egyptian and Mesopotamian times. Their symbolic meanings have been beneficial to artists, though different cultures have used trees to represent different ideas. Life, fertility, knowledge and salvation are just a few of the themes that trees have been used to represent.
Much of the Italian Renaissance was about precision and accuracy, reaching new levels never seen before. Artists within it, as well as from the Northern Renaissance, would therefore attempt to capture trees as precisely as possible through repetitive practice and also from careful observation.
Tree paintings then started to become more common within European art thanks to the rise in prominence of landscape painting. The Romanticists would use them to represent the beauty of nature more generally, before later artists started to create abstract forms of them in a more expressive manner.
Tree paintings have also been useful for representing a particular region, with many trees being found more commonly in some locations than others – one example would be the cypress trees found in Tuscany, or some of the British-based trees found in the work of Turner and Constable.
Techniques and Styles: Unleashing the Artistic Vision in Tree Paintings
The most radical aspect of tree painting is in the inclusion of elements of a tree within the art itself. Many will be familiar with trips to a primary school, where children are collecting leaves and branches, or perhaps a small piece of bark, and then attaching it to paper with glue.
Professional artists have even done similar, in a more nuanced manner. This helps to bring a connection between the art and its subject, but is not easy to do effectively. Alternatives include adding sand or stone to a painting.
In terms of more traditional art, artists will observe a tree in great detail, attempting to capture every aspect of it. This could be within the Romanticist or Renaissance eras. More recently, artists might use an expressive manner to give a broad impression of a tree, often with almost no detail whatsoever – in that case, the use of color can be critical.
