Focus Works of Art | Lesson Plans

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Focus Works of Art
Three Trees, Two Clouds

John Beerman (American) Three Trees, Two Clouds, 1990

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North Carolina Regions
Greensboro native John Beerman resides in the Hudson River Valley of New York but turns his gaze toward home in Three Trees, Two Clouds. Three evenly spaced evergreen trees dominate the foreground of the painting. One tree centers the composition, and the other two extend across the edges of the canvas. A softly glowing orange light filters through the overhanging expanse of clouds to bounce off the tree limbs and blades of brown grass. Two wispy clouds hover in the spaces between the trees. A more irregular band of trees populates the rolling hills that extend into the distance. The clouds that cover the sky take up an amount of space equivalent to the grassy land at the bottom of the painting and contribute to the overall symmetry.

What was Beerman's inspiration for this landscape?
Beerman's inspiration comes almost literally from his mother's backyard. Fond of the views from his mother's farm in the Haw River country of Alamance County, the artist presents a serene and balanced scene of the North Carolina Piedmont. The careful symmetry of the scene gives away the secret that this is not an exact depiction of the landscape. Beerman likes to venture into nature with a camera and a box of paint tubes and supplies to sketch scenery. Once he is back in his studio, the photographs supply Beerman with details to create his improvised scenes, and the sketches contribute impressions of colors, light and moods experienced outdoors. In Three Trees, Two Clouds, this method creates a surreal atmosphere resulting from the orange sky and symmetry of the nearly identical trees and clouds.

Much like the Hudson River School painters of the 19th century, Beerman combines varied elements of scenery to produce a unified and emblematic vision of a place. While many contemporary artists are drawn to the brash modernity of cities and technology, Beerman produces a more contemplative art influenced by 19th-century landscape painting traditions, as exemplified in the works of artists such as Thomas Cole and Jasper Cropsey.

How does the work reflect North Carolina's Piedmont region?
Neither flat nor precipitously high, the land rises and falls gently in Beerman's scene. Hills appear in the distance, but they do not approach the grand heights of the Appalachian Mountains. A dense blanket of grass covers the ground. Unlike in the Coastal Plain, patches of sandy soil do not interrupt grass in the Piedmont. What type of soil is found in the Piedmont? What crops are grown in the Piedmont? Is it an area that is more urban or more rural?