Rose Garden

Artist Maria Oakey Dewing (1845 - 1927)

Date1901

MediumOil on canvas

Dimensions24 x 40 1/2 in. (61 x 102.9 cm)
Framed: 39 1/2 × 55 1/2 × 2 1/2 in.

ClassificationsPainting

Credit LineCrystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Bentonville, Arkansas, 2006.67

Signedl.l., in brown paint: Maria Oakey Dewing 1901

Accession number 2006.67

On View

On view

Provenanceacquired from the Artist by Whitelaw Reid [1837-1912] and Elisabeth Mills Reid [d. 1931], New York, NY; to Estate of Mrs. Whitelaw Reid, 1931; to (American Art Association-Anderson Galleries, New York, NY), May 2, 1934, lot 305; purchased by Mrs. J.W.S. Reid, 1934; (T.R. Baird), New York, NY; purchased by Private Collection, New York, 1976; to (Sotheby's, New York, NY), May 24, 2000, lot 18; purchased by Private Collection, U.S., 2000; to (Sotheby's, New York, NY), November 29, 2006, lot 40; purchased by Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Bentonville, AR, 2006
Label Text“It is easy to write, it is almost impossible to paint,” declared a seventeen-year-old Maria Oakey Dewing. Nevertheless, Dewing spent the rest of her life deeply committed to painting. Rose Garden was painted during the last summer she and her husband, artist Thomas Wilmer Dewing, spent in the rural artist colony of Cornish, New Hampshire, escaping the daily grind of the city. The way the flowers extend to the edge of the frame places the viewer in the thick of the garden with the artist.

“Es fácil escribir, es casi imposible pintar”, expresó Maria Oakey Dewey cuando tenía diecisiete años. Aún así, Dewing dedicó el resto de su vida a la pintura. Maria pintó esta obra durante el último verano que pasó junto a su esposo, el artista Thomas Wilmer Dewing, en la colonia artística rural de Cornish, Nuevo Hampshire, para escapar el ajetreo constante de la ciudad. La forma en la que las flores se extienden hacia el borde del cuadro, sitúa al espectador en medio del jardín junto con la artista.