Focus on Lake with Dead Trees and explain the Visual analysis and composition.
Simply named, Lake with Dead Trees exemplifies the typical stylistic traits of the Hudson River School art movement. The viewer’s eye is drawn first to the stand of snags foremost, which is highlighted starkly by warm morning light. They are skeletal, stripped of leaves, of bark, of any branch that would not bend. They embody death and they are surrounded by life. 
The trees are twisted splintering apart at the core as if by some great ravaging storm. The exposed raw wood shines sun-bleached in shades of pale yellow, white, and gray, the only darker pigments used to define shadows cast by light from the upper right side of the painting. Following vibrant trees along the lakeside, and along the bottom of the painting, there is further evidence of a great storm; downed and fallen trees lie by ample water, sunlight, and nutrient rich soil, conditions in which the surrounding trees thrive. 
The 27 x 33 3/4 in. dimensions of Lake with Dead Trees make it reminiscent of a picture window offering a portal to the Catskill mountains in southeastern New York State. The painting does not present a specific moment in time, rather it exists. It seems to indicate that within the delicate balance of beauty and life, there is also a strength that will slowly rise and reclaim where ruin has set foot. 
As the viewer’s gaze sweeps from the bottom left of the painting, a scene of destruction evokes emotions of loss and regret. Moving up to the right side of the painting and across the sky, sentiments shift with the change in light. From left to right, the sky clears from a ruminating storm to the respite of a clearing sky. On the left of the painting, the dead trees are prominent, as evident by their size and proximity. As the scene moves right, the dead trees become smaller; they decrease in importance, fade, and give way to living trees and new life. 
Each of these transitions, from left to right, are smooth, natural motions across realistic spectrums of extremes, until the viewer’s eye is caught and disrupted by the two deer crossing the painting. Captured in the pristine and graceful scene, the deer appeared overly poised, lacking the fluidity found elsewhere. In 1825, an unnamed contemporary viewer noted Cole might easily have omitted the two deer, as they “detracted from [the] foreground.”
Hudson River School New York State