The new exhibit at the Florence Griswold Museum, “The Artist’s Garden,” digs much deeper than its immediate subject matter. Inspired by the Garden Movement (1887-1920), a time of intense social and political change, it explores the impact of patriotism, immigration, women’s suffrage and urbanization on the growth of the garden in both private and public spaces.

The only New England venue for the show organized by the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, the Florence Griswold Museum has customized the exhibit with works (more than half) from its permanent collection of American Impressionist paintings, as well as sculpture, prints, books and photographs all emphasizing the changing landscape of gardening at the turn of the 20th century.

“The theme of this show is such a natural fit with our material and the story of the art colony and Miss Florence’s interest in gardens,” says curator Amy Kurtz Lansing.

“One of the things this show offers that’s new is recognizing that being involved in gardens wasn’t just an elite thing,” she adds, “but during this time period, gardening actually shifts from something done by a professional paid staff member for a wealthy person on their estate to something that with the rise of the suburbs, people were doing in their own newly acquired backyards.”

Kurtz Lansing explains that this created a pervasive new popular interest in gardening and women were the people driving it.

“In the progressive era, you have these new roles for women,” she says. “Some of the more elite figures are actually the people on the vanguard of pushing for women’s suffrage — they had the means and education to be those kinds of advocates.”

These women are depicted in the section of the exhibit titled “The Lady in the Garden” and includes photographs of Old Lyme’s Ludington gardens, tended by Katharine Ludington, who combined her social and progressive political work with an interest in gardening.

“Katharine was from a wealthy family and inherited her grandmother’s home and gardens in Old Lyme,” Kurtz Lansing says. “She was a professional artist — women were starting to be (taken seriously) as artists and she became very involved in 1914 in advocating for women’s suffrage and also for international peace. She was one of the founders of the League of Women Voters and helped make ratification of the 19th amendment happen in Connecticut.”

A portrait of Ludington’s sister-in-law, Ethel Saltus Ludington, by Cecilia Beaux captures her participation in the elite Philadelphia gardening scene. She is seated in her garden like a muse with a green silk ribbon tied to her hair like creeping vines attached with camellias.

“Ethel designed the gardens at her estate but also supported settlement housework and the idea that one of the things that would improve life for working women would be access to nature,” Kurtz Lansing says. “So she sponsors homes in the country where working women can get away and have vacations and supports other women in the creation of artwork.”

The painting “June” was produced for a magazine cover by Violet Oakley, an illustrator, muralist, writer and pacifist who enjoyed a lucrative career as a commercial and decorative artist.

“She lived in a communal house with other women who named themselves the ‘Red Rose Girls’ where they pursued the most avant-garde ideas about women having independence from domesticity and (obtaining) professional success,” Kurtz Lansing says.

Another section of the show titled “American Artists, European Gardens” reflects how American painters developed their interest in garden subjects through travel and study in Europe and created their own style of Impressionism with gardens as ideal settings for plein-air painting.

“The idea is when you’re in your suburban garden, in the countryside, those are places for rejuvenation, accessing your own creativity — what everyone is doing in an art colony,” Kurtz Lansing notes.

The section “The Artist’s Garden” focuses on the Lyme Art Colony and includes the painting “Kalmia” by Willard Metcalf, which picks up on the idea of how these gardens were really promoting a certain vision of American identity, Kurtz Lansing observes.

“Kalmia is the scientific name for Mountain Laurel, a flower that grows native to Connecticut and embodies all of these traits of this Puritan, New England identity that can weather the winter,” she points out, “really defining what it is to be an American and a New Englander.” 

City bound

While rural and suburban dwelling Americans designed gardens around their private homes in the late 19th century, public parks were being created for city dwellers.

Paintings in this section include Maurice Prendergast’s “Promenade,” of a waterfront garden and park in Boston; Childe Hassam’s “The Hovel and the Skyscraper” that offers a view of New York City’s Central Park, revealing the complex relationship between the city and the garden; and “Peony Window Panel,” from a large Tiffany stained-glass window made for the palatial Mellon estate in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

“One of the things argued in the show is that the very interest in depicting gardens is a response to the rise of cities, the boom in immigration, and people’s feeling that they didn’t have ready access to outdoor spaces, and so parks were developed,” Kurtz Lansing explains.

“City parks are a place people can go for leisure, but everybody shows up and it was playing out a lot of tensions between different kinds of people in the city — when it was open, who’s using it — even though its very existence was to (bring people together),” she continues. “It really stirred up a lot of issues. Democracy in access at that time and now is a very double-sided issue for people of different classes to consider.”

Kurtz Lansing refers to a quote by landscape architect Beatrix Jones Farrand that is posted at the beginning of the exhibit: “The two arts of painting and garden design are closely related, except that the landscape gardener paints with actual color, line, and perspective to make a composition … while the painter has but a flat surface on which to create his illusion.”

“She’s talking about how the gardener has these tools and the painter has these tools and they’re both trying to do the same thing,” Kurtz Lansing says. “I think that’s also a core idea of this show.”

Celebration of Miss Florence’s Historic Gardens

Complementing “The Artist’s Garden: American Impressionism and the Garden Movement” exhibition, on view through Sept. 18, the museum’s seventh annual GardenFest (through June 12) offers activities for all ages and interests.

UPCOMING EVENTS

June 7, 6 to 9 p.m., “Hands-On Digital Photography Workshop” focusing on gardens with master teaching artist Craig Norton. Light refreshments included. Bring digital camera; $12 (members $10).

June 8, presentations at 11 a.m. and 1 p.m. “Herbs for Hearth and Health.” Leslie Evans, historian and museum director at the Avery-Copp House Museum in Groton, teaches historic uses for both common and lesser-known herbs in cooking and medicine before participants create their own herbal vinegar and fragrant sachet. Herbal-infused snacks and beverages for tasting included.

June 9, 2 p.m. “Gardening with Kids: Opening Eyes and Doors.” In this talk Karen Bussolini, garden coach, writer and photographer, shows easy ways to make the whole yard a safe place rich with sensory stimulation and opportunities for imaginative play, discovery and fun; $7 (members $5).

June 10-12: “Blooms with a View: A Display of Art & Flower” featuring arrangements by 15 floral artists that play off the colors, line, shapes and subject matter of the artwork in the exhibition.

June 11, 11 a.m.-3 p.m. “Tinkerbell’s Summertime Garden Crafting Party” children’s event. Featured artist Rochelle Weinrauch of Simply Enchanted in Westerly and museum education staff. Enjoy sweet treats and garden and flower-based crafts while waiting for Tinkerbell, who will share stories and songs before posing for pictures.

June 12, 1 to 4 p.m. Connecticut Impressionist Dmitri Wright creates an Impressionistic painting working “en plein air,” in the museum gardens, demonstrating the steps involved in going from blank canvas to a garden rendered in color and light.

The Florence Griswold Museum is at 96 Lyme St in Old Lyme. Events (except where indicated otherwise) are included with admission. Children 12 and younger get in free. For more information, visit FlorenceGriswoldMuseum.org or call (860) 434-5542, ext. 111.