Final answer:
Thomas Cole was a famous landscape painter and the spiritual father of wilderness landscape artists. He elevated the landscape genre to the status of historical painting and influenced artists of the Hudson River School like Frederic Edwin Church and Albert Bierstadt.
Step-by-step explanation:
Thomas Cole was a famous landscape painter and became the spiritual father of wilderness landscape artists. He exerted a powerful influence on the course of landscape painting in the United States during the nineteenth century. Cole elevated the landscape genre to the status of historical painting and inspired artists like Frederic Edwin Church, Albert Bierstadt, and others. Cole's influence can be seen in the works of the Hudson River School painters who followed him.