Object number2015.22.2
Springside: Center Circle
Date1852
Artist
Henry Gritten
(British, 1818-1873)
CultureBritish
MediumOil on canvas
DimensionsOverall: 25 9/16 x 37 in. (65 x 94 cm)
Framed: 32 5/8 x 44 x 3 1/8 in. (82.9 x 111.8 x 7.9 cm)
Framed: 32 5/8 x 44 x 3 1/8 in. (82.9 x 111.8 x 7.9 cm)
Credit LineGift of Thomas M. Evans, Jr., in honor of Tania Goss Evans, class of 1959
On View
On viewPeriod19th c
Classification(s)
SignedSigned lower right: H. Gritten
InscribedBy artist, lower right: 1852
BibliographySchuyler, David, Apostle of Taste: Andrew Jackson Downing. Maryland: The John Hopkins University Press, 1996, pp.167, 169 ProvenanceMatthew Vassar (1792-1868); Karl Keiling (1865-1939) and Helma Zoellner Keiling (1864-1926); Ella Zoellner (1885-1972), sister; by descent; Christie's, New York, American Furniture and Decorative Arts, January 23, 2009, lot 255. Thomas M. Evans, Jr. Vassar Exhibitions
Exhibition HistoryAmerican Stories 1800 - 1950, Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center, Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, NY, January 29 - April 17, 2016Label TextWhile Matthew Vassar purchased Springside’s grounds hoping to use it for a rural cemetery, the cemetery committee went another direction, leaving the land for his own use. In order to begin improvements to the grounds, Vassar hired Andrew Jackson Downing, who was a highly influential figure in American landscape architecture due to his popular writings on home design for all economic levels. Downing collaborated with Vassar and Calvert Vaux, Downing’s architecture partner, who later worked with Frederick Law Olmsted to create Central Park. An advocate for appreciating nature, Downing utilized the topography of the landscape, creating individual “rooms” for the rugged, wooded knolls, serene meadows, and rushing springs that were viewed from the curving carriage trails. Gritten’s painting displays the perfect circular geometries of the trails and uncultivated pockets of vegetation that encapsulate Downing’s love for both the graceful and the rugged, which he characterized as the Beautiful and the Picturesque.
- Pippa Kennedy ’26
Object information is a work in progress and may be updated as new research findings emerge.
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Henry Gritten
1852
Culture: British, American
