When this painting was exhibited at the National Academy of Design, it was lauded as a near transcription of "perfect and sublime" wild nature. Durand's scrupulous attention to detail, which approaches the Ruskinian insistence on strict adherence to nature, distances this work from that of his more romantic predecessor, Thomas Cole. In the Woods is more textually rendered than Durand's earlier The Beeches. Its vertical format and intimate perspective complement the character of the subject matter and are the product of oil sketches that Durand made outdoors. The artist urged the direct study of nature but was also influenced by the works of Dutch and Flemish artists and by the Barbizon painters. The composition has been linked as well to William Cullen Bryant's poem "Inscription for the Entrance to a Wood." Bryant's emphasis on the forest as a respite from civilization and a place of religious meditation is evident in the hushed, pious mood of the glade, whose tall trees suggest a Gothic church interior. Compared to the oil study for In the Woods (Smith College Museum of Art, Northampton, Massachusetts), Durand increased the concentration of dead limbs in the final work, creating a somber and melancholic tone. In the years before the Civil War, the artist suffered personal difficulties and failing optimism about the country's political situation and its effect on the American landscape.

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