George Inness was a painter born in 1825 on a small farm in Newburgh, New York. Per his own letters, he was known as "naturally nervous, impressionable, and sensitive to the richness of coloring". As a result, his art often featured vast agricultural landscapes with cows and menacing clouds somewhere in the sky. During this time period, the idea of manifest destiny was that it was gods will for the United States to spread throughout the American continents. Inness illustrated the ideals of manifest destiny through his use of light, setting, and subjects.
First of all, Inness uses light in most of his works to illustrate his belief in manifest destiny. In his piece, "Sunset on the River", the upper left section of features dark, stormy clouds, which appear to be moving west. On the right side, we can see bright white fluffy clouds coming from the east replacing them. This represents the untamed, vicious West being replaced by the heavenly, peaceful, East. You can also see the sun coming through the clouds, which is showing how the East is bringing enlightenment to the savage West. Inness spent a large portion of his career studying the Hudson River School Movement, which featured landscapes like this one. Another thing he does in "Sunset on the River" is focus the light on the small farmhouse, which is saying that settlement is a good thing, because we can also see the dark untamed wilderness in the background. George Inness uses light in his paintings to support manifest destiny.
Another painting that demonstrates Inness' support of manifest destiny is "The Lackawanna Valley". His paintings were mostly landscapes of farmland or cleared land, which is what the United States was doing to the country at this time. In his painting "The Lackawanna Valley" you can see a cleared hill, covered in new stumps. This supports manifest destiny because it is showing settled land in the background and a man who just cleared the foreground is lying back watching a train come through.
