Highlights of the Academy collection of Seton Drawings and Paintings
Untitled Tree Sketch by Ernest Thompson Seton
ALL #4059 Untitled tree study. Graphite on paper. 43.4 x 37 cm. Place and date of creation unknown.
Likely the trees are Birch, a common species of northern forests. Birch occupies a similar ecological niche as Aspens. They are in different families.* Aspens have staked out forests farther south in the Rockies although in places such as the Black Hills of South Dakota both are present. They look similar in their leafless winter state. Based on the condition of the paper (old) and subject matter I suspect this one is a nineteenth century study from Canada where Seton lived as a youth and young man.
It is possible to read too much into a drawing like this which may be no more than an exact replica recorded by the artist while out on a woodland walk. But it appears to me that he has captured the trees as a dynamic part of the forest. The one on the farthest right leans precariously while its neighbor appears reduced to the merest snag. The two on the left run together in a gently merging curve, bending away from the insecure other two. Were these two couples beside one another, or are they separate pairs occupying the same piece of paper?
I prefer the first more poetic interpretation. Art history is filled with stories of how trees give insight into the psychological state of visual artists.
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*Family names: Betulaceae for Birch and Populus for Aspens