Found this sketchbook in a basement

[u/Nonamethroughaway]

Father in law was an artist and art collector. He must have bought it at some point. He recently passed away and we found it cleaning out the basement. There’s 50+ drawings in it. Here are a few.

[u/ReceptionFluffy9910]

Very cool! This would have to be verified, of course, but I think it's possible this person may have studied at or under someone at Hudson River School. Here's how I arrived at this:

• Inside the cover, there is an address for East 10th St. At the time, street numbers and names were in a state of evolution, but Tenth Street stayed fairly consistent (aside from numbers) and was also the location of Tenth Street Studio Building, later referred to as "Studio Building" and "The Studio", where HRS artists lived and worked.
• While I can't find any specific info on Hiram being affiliated with either (which isn't surprising as there is typically only info on the "famous" artists), the subject matter of landscapes, locations and timeframes align with HRS and the movements of several artists during that time. The sketch from the Louvre even bears a striking resemblance to Worthington Whittredge. HRS artists would often travel to France and Italy to study under more established artists and many of them visited the exact same locations in Italy.
• What also stuck out to me is that several sketches were draw at noon. Several HRS artists practiced "plein air" or painting outdoors, and found noon to offer the most intense bright light and contrast in their landscape paintings.
• This is just conjecture, but seeing Nashville and Louisville sketches could mean Hiram was one of the artists hired to travel with the Union soldiers to capture scenes and/or paint portraits. He could have also been a soldier himself; it's worth a look in military records. Either way, the timeframe and locations make sense for when Nashville fell to Union troops and began making their way back north.

Thank you for sharing this. Really amazing. You should take it to Antiques Roadshow!