Study of Varied Flowers with a Hummingbird
Study of Varied Flowers with a Hummingbird
Artist
Martin Johnson Heade
(1819 - 1904)
Dateca. 1870
MediumOil and pencil on canvas
Dimensions17 × 21 in. (43.2 × 53.3 cm)
Framed: 24 3/8 × 28 1/2 × 1 1/2 in.
Framed: 24 3/8 × 28 1/2 × 1 1/2 in.
ClassificationsPainting
Credit LineCrystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Bentonville, Arkansas, 2007.205
Accession number
2007.205
On View
On viewLabel TextAlthough Heade never exhibited his floral studies, he repurposed their contents countless times. Individual flowers included in these compositions appear in numerous finished oil paintings. Study of Varied Flowers with a Hummingbird features the elegant Dendrobium orchid, which grows primarily in Indonesia, alongside several gladioli, a rubrum lily, and a rose. Heade’s inclusion of a hummingbird in this flower study suggests the artist likely painted it while working on his orchid and hummingbird compositions. Similar to his earlier Gems of Brazil (ca.1864), these paintings portray hummingbirds with iridescent feathers in jewel-like colors surrounded by lush tropical settings abundant with wild orchids. Unlike flowers grown in the gardens of northern climates, the orchid was a highly eroticized botanical specimen that intrigued and challenged the Victorians. Heade painted dozens of flower studies throughout his career, though relatively few survive. In 1904, the aging painter gave several of them to a young art student in Florida, where he had lived since 1883. This study was among that group.
Inscribedu.r.: De Rham's Garnet
