American Visions: The Epic History of Art in America

by Robert Hughes

Writing with all the brilliance, authority, and pungent wit that have distinguished his art criticism for Time magazine and his greatly acclaimed study of modern art, The Shock of the New, Robert Hughes now addresses his largest subject: the history of art in America.

The intense relationship between the American people and their surroundings has been the source of a rich artistic tradition. American Visions is a consistently revealing demonstration of the many ways in which artists have expressed this pervasive connection. In nine eloquent chapters, which span the whole range of events, movements, and personalities of more than three centuries, Robert Hughes shows us the myriad associations between the unique society that is America and the art it has produced:

"O My America, My New Founde Land"  explores the churches, religious art, and artifacts of the Spanish invaders of the Southwest and the Puritans of New England; the austere esthetic of the Amish, the Quakers, and the Shakers; and the Anglophile culture of Virginia.

"The Republic of Virtue"  sets forth the ideals of neo-classicism as interpreted in the paintings of Benjamin West, John Singleton Copley, and the Peale family, and in the public architecture of Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Latrobe, and Charles Bulfinch.

"The Wilderness and the West"  discusses the work of landscape painters such as Thomas Cole, Frederick Church, and the Luminists, who viewed the natural world as "the fingerprint of God's creation,"  and of those who recorded America's westward expansion--George Caleb Bingham, Albert Bierstadt, and Frederic Remington--and the accompanying shift in the perception of the Indian, from noble savage to outright demon.

"American Renaissance" describes the opulent era that followed the Civil War, a cultural flowering expressed in the sculpture of Augustus Saint-Gaudens; the paintings of John Singer Sargent, Mary Cassatt, and Childe Hassam; the Newport cottages of the super-rich; and the beaux-arts buildings of Stanford White and his partners.

"The Gritty Cities"  looks at the post-Civil War years from another perspective: cast-iron cityscapes, the architecture of Louis Henri Sullivan, and the new realism of Thomas Eakins, Winslow Homer, the trompe-l'oeil painters, and the Ashcan School.

"Early Modernism" introduces the first American avant garde: the painters Arthur Dove, Marsden Hartley, Joseph Stella, Charles Demuth, Charles Sheeler, and Georgia O'Keeffe, and the premier architect of his time, Frank Lloyd Wright.

"Streamlines and Breadlines"  surveys the boom years, when skyscrapers and Art Deco were all the rage . . . and the bust years that followed, when painters such as Edward Hopper, Stuart Davis, Thomas Hart Benton, Diego Rivera, and Jacob Lawrence showed Americans "the way we live now."

"The Empire of Signs"  examines the American hegemony after World War II, when the Abstract Expressionists (Jackson Pollock, Willem de Kooning, Mark Rothko, et al.) ruled the artistic roost, until they were dethroned by Jasper Johns, Robert Rauschenberg, the Pop artists, and Andy Warhol, while individualists such as David Smith and Joseph Cornell marched to their own music.

"The Age of Anxiety"  considers recent events: the return of figurative art and the appearance of minimal and conceptual art; the speculative mania of the 1980s, which led to scandalous auction practices and inflated reputations; and the trends and issues of art in the 90s.

Lavishly illustrated and packed with biographies, anecdotes, astute and stimulating critical commentary, and sharp social history, American Visions is published in association with a new eight-part PBS television series. Robert Hughes has called it "a love letter to America."  This superb volume, which encompasses and enlarges upon the series, is an incomparably entertaining and insightful contemplation of its splendid subject.

Genres: Art, History, Nonfiction, Art History, American History, Architecture, Art and Photography

635 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1997

About the author

Robert Studley Forrest Hughes, AO was an Australian art critic, writer and television documentary maker who has resided in New York since 1970. He was educated at St Ignatius' College, Riverview before going on to study arts and then architecture at the University of Sydney. At university, Hughes associated with the Sydney "Push" – a group of artists, writers, intellectuals and drinkers. Among the group were Germaine Greer and Clive James. Hughes, an aspiring artist and poet, abandoned his university endeavours to become first a cartoonist and then an art critic for the Sydney periodical The Observer, edited by Donald Horne. Around this time he wrote a history of Australian painting, titled The Art of Australia, which is still considered to be an important work. It was published in 1966. Hughes was also briefly involved in the original Sydney version of Oz magazine, and wrote art criticism for The Nation and The Sunday Mirror.

Hughes left Australia for Europe in 1964, living for a time in Italy before settling in London, England (1965) where he wrote for The Spectator, The Daily Telegraph, The Times and The Observer, among others, and contributed to the London version of Oz. In 1970 he obtained the position of art critic for TIME magazine and he moved to New York. He quickly established himself in the United States as an influential art critic.In 1975, he and Don Brady provided the narration for the film Protected, a documentary showing what life was like for Indigenous Australians on Palm Island.

In 1980, the BBC broadcast The Shock of the New, Hughes's television series on the development of modern art since the Impressionists. It was accompanied by a book of the same name; its combination of insight, wit and accessibility are still widely praised. In 1987, The Fatal Shore, Hughes's study of the British penal colonies and early European settlement of Australia, became an international best-seller.

Hughes provided commentary on the work of artist Robert Crumb in parts of the 1994 film Crumb, calling Crumb "the American Breughel". His 1997 television series American Visions reviewed the history of American art since the Revolution. He was again dismissive of much recent art; this time, sculptor Jeff Koons was subjected to criticism. Australia: Beyond the Fatal Shore (2000) was a series musing on modern Australia and Hughes's relationship with it. Hughes's 2002 documentary on the painter Francisco Goya, Goya: Crazy Like a Genius, was broadcast on the first night of the BBC's domestic digital service. Hughes created a one hour update to The Shock of the New. Titled The New Shock of the New, the program aired first in 2004. Hughes published the first volume of his memoirs, Things I Didn’t Know, in 2006.

Reviews

[Stewart Tame · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is a companion volume to a PBS series that aired during the late 90's. Since Hughes' book, The Shock of the New, had been one of the principal texts responsible for my love of 20th century art ("Modern Art" sounds weird to me since some of it was created over 100 years ago, and 21st century art didn't exist at the time), I of course had to watch it. And then I bought the book when it became available, and have reread it a few times since then.

Anyway, a recent visit to the Detroit Institute of Arts prompted me to dig this out and read it again. As the cover promises, this is a history of Art in the USA from the colonial era right up until the early 90's. Obviously the subject is broad and your favorite artist might be given short shrift, but Hughes gives a good overview of the major trends and figures. As with any art text, there are numerous works mentioned that don't appear in any of the photos. If you've read enough art books and/or visited enough museums, you may have seen some of them. But the illustrations that did make it into the book are well-chosen and plentiful.

Hughes is one of the better writers of Art books out there. He's not above using jargon and theory, but he tries to keep it useful rather than as a means of dazzling the reader. If you're interested in the history of American Art, this book is an excellent place to start.

[Candi · Rating 5 out of 5]

Read the whole book in college, and watched the movies. They're actually quite good. I find myself still thinking about them 10 years later.

[Ray Dunsmore · Rating 4 out of 5]

A staunchly-opinionated, frank, fascinating account of the development of art in my home country. Hughes' no-holds-barred criticism is honestly refreshing to hear from an academic art writer. If he sees problems in an artist's work or doesn't see much worth in it at all, he is entirely unafraid to say so. He lays down his biases in plain text and you know enough to skew around them and take what he's saying with a degree of uncertainty. That's important, honestly. The subterfuge of feigning objectivity to claim to have the one unimpeachable truth is not something I favor in my historical texts, quite frankly. You can't be sure of getting the whole truth from any historical text and the more the author realizes that fact, the more I feel I'm getting my information from secure hands - and if not, I can at least see what biases to attempt to pry behind. Fascinating stuff with great insight into the thought and minds that went into the major pieces of American art since the country's founding.

[Will Allen · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'll refrain from saying much since my students are currently writing reviews on one of the video episodes. I will gladly say this: Of all the books I have used over the years to teach the history of American art, this (and the videos) succeed beyond any other. My students like it. They like the man. Even when he disappoints a reader who reads or sees a favorite artist "put down" by Hughes, they honestly respect his opinion. He is one of those critics who never seems cynical even when he dismisses an artist. He comes across as honest and most students respect his opinion. I end the semester having students watch videos outside of those included in American Visions. "The Business of Art. Damien Hirst is all hype (interviews with the Mugrabis--wonderful) Finally I have them watch some of the tributes to Hughes.

[Janet · Rating 4 out of 5]

illustrations were excellent. I learned a lot especially about 18th and 19th century american painting. The book dragged a bit at the end when the late 20th century was covered in too much detail and Hughes sarcastically quoted the unintelligible explanations with which the artists explained their art again and again. Hughes thinks Pollock and Hopper were the most creative 20th century American painters and he convinced me.

[Becca · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is an incredible addition to a humanities library. With a sweeping look at the arts in America, the thing that sets this book apart from the rest is the author's ability to give *context* to it all. You get this great feel for what was going on in America and the world at the time that made this painting or that statue so valued or memorable, even if we might think it's the ugliest thing we've ever seen. I also love that Robert Hughes isn't afraid to express his opinion about various works, whether I agree with it or not. This is one textbook that I didn't sell back and continue to read and refer to years later.

[Suzy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Definitive historical guide to American art. Enthralling.

[h b · Rating 5 out of 5]

(4.5 honestly, but....) watched alongside the tv series. the best book on art i’ve read alongside ways of seeing and hughes’ other book the shock of the new. he’s one of my favorite critics now: witty, democratically minded, hates pretense, really good at articulating how to look. extremely opinionated but mostly right (and 20 years on definitely vindicated in how much he hates the art market. thank god him and berger didn’t live to find out about NFTs.) plus when you disagree with the text you get to feel like a smart independent thinker who goes their own way. i found myself slowing down and doubling back to really take in some of these illustrations based on his analysis, which my idiot brain almost never does. visual art can be such a forbidding and opaque subject but it doesn't have to be. looking and thinking is available to everyone. you don't have to apologize for beauty or pleasure. he makes it tangible, comprehensible, and exciting for nearly 700 pages as well as using it to advance a greater thesis on the country as a whole, which only an outsider could do. terrific book.

[David Ryan · Rating 4 out of 5]

An art critic nonpareil I began reading his art criticisms in Time magazine in the ’70s and have since read all his art related books. This book was published in conjunction with the eight-part PBS series. I had the pleasure of meeting Hughes while acquiring the book at a book-signing event (which he generously autographed to Anne, my wife). You may not wish to read it cover to cover (I didn’t), but one chapter will invariably lead to others if you’re, as Hughes says, “a general intelligent reader, what American academics often profess to believe no longer exists.” If it does whet your appetite, do check out his many other titles on line, art or otherwise. An amazing writer.

[Scott · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantastic overview of American art. Someone from somewhere else (Australia) had to write it, even though Hughes was the art critic for "Time" magazine. No high faluting theory here, well written witty prose sets a context and provides understanding of those blotches on the wall that are "modern art". Hughes has the right attitude, not quite sneering at manifestos issued to an -ism adherents, but informative and conversational. A huge gorgeous doorstop of a book, enjoyed over many nights.

[Claire · Rating 5 out of 5]

Truly wonderful writing, witty the entire way. The scope of art here is comprehensive to a point (unfortunately, only really mentioning Native American and indigenous art when it serves as context to a Spanish church built on top of a temple in the Southwest, or Bierstadt or Remington, for example), but I can forgive its faults with the realization that what art history is omitted here deserves many, many books of its own. To counter this, I'll add that Hughes is (perhaps almost) always a great reminder of the injustices, genocides, and violence committed against Native Americans, immigrants, and minorities throughout American history. He chooses art which reflects these horrors and identifies the hateful and violent streak within many artists' personal biographies and ideologies, sometimes shockingly. In many ways, this book is a brilliant treatment of its subject, one without too much gloss and one which is highly critical. My complaint, since I did read this as a textbook for my American Art History undergrad class, is that it often feels very biased, even for all its highly academic, researched, knowledgeable content. Hughes writes about art often subjectively, sometimes skewing his comments of "this painting is bad" to sound like fact ( "the technique is sloppy", "the symbolism/iconography/motifs are indecipherable", "I don't agree with this artist's politics", e.g. -- these could all be correct or astute observations of a piece or its creator, but in objective academic writing, especially in something which is read as a textbook and not a collection of personal essays, perhaps one shouldn't necessarily be "teaching" from this kind of perspective; but everybody is guilty of this, not just Hughes). My class also confusingly had content written supposedly with this book as its guide, but which ultimately contradicted its factual and analytical statements time and time again, leading several students to just stop reading it, and me to lament that this book, even with all its small annoyances, was so much more comprehensive, well-researched, honest and thought-provoking than our class material (and many other academic treatments of the same subject).

My point, I guess? Please read this book if you are interested in American art history. You might skip a few pages here and there (it is roughly textbook sized), but it is well worth your time in its discussion of history through at times raucous, entertaining prose. Just please maybe don't use this as a textbook for a class, if you're just going to pretend you don't hear what it's saying.

[Dru · Rating 3 out of 5]

As the subtitle indicates, this is a history of America through art, and it's beautifully produced, with heavy paper and lovely color illustrations. (And beautifully produced to a fault--it's a heavy tome!)
Hughes is mostly a terrific writer but sometimes, especially when discussing modern art in chapter 9, he twists himself into the art-historical jargon of the time. What comes out is the same meaningless hooey that the artists and critics themselves espoused. (And of course Hughes was a critic for Time magazine.)

And much of his choices for inclusion/exclusions would just not pass muster today. A couple of his descriptions of women are really ridiculous, for example, Edward Hopper's wife (p. 428): "Jo Hopper may have been an untamed shrew." Really? How many of the men in the book, artists or not, get such treatment? And he certainly doesn't spend a lot of time on any but the standard white male artists.

[Drew Plummer · Rating 3 out of 5]

As an overall history of American art, this is one of the more comprehensive that I have read. The illustrations are helpful, if perhaps a touch sparse. The coverage of major American art schools and architectural movements up through Abstract Expressionism is thorough, often thoughtful, and generally illuminating. As Hughes gets closer and closer to contemporary art he begins to leave the role of dispassionate historian and speak with a critic’s voice, which I found somewhat distracting.
Overall a worthwhile read, even if the last few chapters should be taken with a small grain of salt.
I will say that Hughes’ use of misogynistic, homophobic, and racist terminology seem excessive even by 1997 standards. I did not expect to find the n-word used fairly casually in an art-history book, and I might be reluctant to read more of Hughes’ work in the future based on that alone.

[William Schram · Rating 5 out of 5]

Australian Critic Robert Hughes writes about the history of art in the United States. The book is a companion to a documentary that came out in the 1990s. The book covers architecture, painting, sculpture, and Church decorations.

Hughes offers a unique perspective, since, as he mentions in the opening, America is a melting pot of cultures. Historically, when you came to America, you would adopt an entirely new way of life. As an example, some of my ancestors were from Prussia, but I don't know a lick of German. As time passes, people in America tend to acclimate to American culture. There are exceptions, of course.

Hughes does a great job. He offers honest criticism and doesn't let it get to his head. I enjoyed the book. Thanks for reading my review, and see you next time.

[Marcas · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a really good History of America, through her art, architecture and people. Hughes helpfully situates American in wider History and shows fine sensitivity to the various strains of influence and life that make up America; a place indeed of many visions.

[Jeffrey S. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very good overview of American Art. I hope I can someday see the PBS mini series it was based upon. This is a thorough discussion and dense book - not an easy read. However the tradeoff in effort was worth the details and insight provided by the knowledgeable art critic author. The pictures were beautiful and of good size.

[Jackie G · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hughes' narration is entertaining as well as informative. The illustrations and anecdotes bring this history alive. Just wish there had been room for even more reproductions of the works described.

[Colin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Really interesting informative accompaniment to the BBC television series. Very detailed account covering all the great American Artists Illustrations excellent

[Niels Frid-Nielsen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Brillant!

[Tony · Rating 5 out of 5]

Deep. Detailed. Thorough.
To study a nation’s art and artists is to study that nation’s cultural, political, economic, sociological, psychological and creative history.

[David C Ward · Rating 4 out of 5]

An engaging survey. Excellent illustrations/plates.

[Christopher]

Long and well-documented history of American art. A little depressing in the concluding chapter.

[David Cowhig · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great overview, richly illustrated. Hughes is a great read -- I've also read "Barcelona", "Rome" and "The Fatal Shore". Great to dip into -- high resolution art photos on nearly every page.

[Erik · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very tendentious and judgmental which is typical for Hughes. I do disagree with him, especially on significance of Hopper, Winslow Homer and Wyeth, among others. My gods are Eakins and Sargent and Whister's etchings. I do like Hughes' courage to make judgments about good and bad in art however, and his send up of the NYC 80s art world as a relativistic PR machine for peddling junk to dealers. This seems to only have gotten worse. But the good news is New York's star has definitely fallen.

[Carol · Rating 5 out of 5]

I used this as a textbook in my classes. Actually I showed the films and the book was recommended.
Hughes was a man of definite opinions with a sardonic sense of humor. The book is an uneven survey (not to mention biased). Better than dry textbooks for stimulating discussion and this was a discussion class. For a good balanced survey of American Art I would recommend either Mendelowitz or Craven.

[Dyer · Rating 5 out of 5]

An illuminating book by an Australian author who also hosted the brilliant television series which this book expands on in a scholarly but accessible manner. The illustrations are vivid and very true to life, but if you get the chance rent the tv series, they're thrilling. The book is available at a very affordable price from various sites listed right here on goodreads.

[Eric McLean · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a great book for anyone looking to understand/appreciate/learn more about American art. Robert Hughes is a talented writer and I enjoyed reading between the lines on some of non-American humor. There are some rather dry parts, but I suppose that's bound to happen in a 600 page book about art. You probably won't enjoy it all.

[Margaret · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this book and watched the accompanying PBS series for a class in school. If you have the ambition, it is well worth the time and effort to read this book and watch (most) of the series (it's on you tube). I am sorry that Robert Hughes has since passed away - I would have been very interested in a follow up.

[Stephen Coates · Rating 5 out of 5]

This well-illustrated book presents a history of the United States through its art from its beginnings as a collection of colonies through independence, westward expansion through various stages to where art was at the time of the book’s publication. Hughes certainly knew his art and the book was an interesting read.

[Suzanne · Rating 4 out of 5]

Rbt Hughes continues to inspire and reveal all the layers of everything - and I mean everything about art - with constant wit, insight and blinding, wildly crass matter of factness. He remains one of my favorite art historians/ critics of all time.