Summer Flowers 1859 By Jerome B Thompson - Poster

Summer Flowers 1859 is a painting by Jerome B. Thompson. To offset the trials of city living, wealthy nineteenth-century New Yorkers often escaped to rural estates, where according to the architectural theorist Andrew Jackson Downing--the “humble roof, shady porch, verdant lawn, and the smiling flowers offered a “barrier against vice, immorality, and bad habits.” Thompson’s cheerful view of a Gothic Revival-style Hudson River Valley home, seen at a distance behind an elegant family seated in a blossoming field, embodies Downing’s bucolic ideal. Although this artwork is digitally restored, the cracks and the fine lines are left intact on this painting to honour the time this painting emerged from.