Martin Hoffman
American, 1935 - 2013Autumn Landscape with Incident, 1980
Not on view
Acrylic on canvas
Dimensions102 × 144 in. (259.1 × 365.8 cm)
Gift of the artist, 2008.38
In the late 1970s Martin Hoffman moved into an old farmhouse in Cooperstown, New York, and began a series of paintings called “Epic Paintings” which included Autumn Landscape with Incident. This large canvas depicts the view from Hoffman’s farm. The rolling hills covered in clover, barley, and cornfields create a valley for Little Elk Creek, which as Hoffman noted was “wild with an abundance of wildlife.” He explained that the incident referred to in the title (depicted in the lower right corner) shows two figures struggling to rescue a drowned red-tailed hawk late in the afternoon.
Hoffman purposefully distorted the action so that viewers can draw their own conclusions. He referred to traditional Chinese landscape painting when talking about this image saying, “A goal of the Chinese artist was to create a vista that the artist or the viewer may then imaginatively step into and disappear.” The massive canvas makes it all the easier for you to become part of this immense landscape.
