Taking its lead from French artists like Renoir and Monet, the American impressionist movement followed its own path which over a forty-year period reveals as much about America as a nation as it does about its art as a creative power-house. It’s a story closely tied to a love of gardens and a desire to preserve nature in a rapidly urbanizing nation. Travelling to studios, gardens and iconic locations throughout the United States, UK and France, this mesmerising film is a feast for the eyes.

In 1886, the French art dealer Paul Durand-Ruel brought a selection of his huge stock of impressionist paintings to New York, changing the course of art in America forever. American artists flocked to the French village of Giverny, home to the master impressionist Claude Monet, and cheered the French new wave: painting outdoors with a new found brilliance and vitality. As Europe recoiled against the work of Monet, Degas and Renoir, Americans embraced it and created their own style of impressionism.

The timing of Durand-Ruel’s transformative visit was perfect. As America steamed into the Industrial Age, urban reformers fought to create public parks and gardens: patches of beauty amid smokestacks and ash heaps. These gardens provided unlimited inspiration for artists and a never-ending oasis for the growing middle class, made up of increasingly independent women, who relished the writings of English horticulturalists Gertrude Jekyll and William Robinson. Meanwhile the rise of wide-circulation magazines cultivated the idea that gardening was a path to spiritual renewal amid industrial blight and the belief that artists should work in native landscapes. As America made its epic move from a nation of farmers to a land of factories, the pioneering American Impressionists crafted a sumptuous visual language that told the story of an era.

The Artist’s Garden: American Impressionism features the sell-out exhibition The Artist’s Garden: American Impressionism and the Garden Movement, 1887–1920 that began at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts and ended at the Florence Griswold Museum, Old Lyme, Connecticut.

"In our Paul Durand-Ruel film ‘The Impressionists – and the Man who Made Them’ we looked at how important the Paris-based dealer was in the story of impressionism. There is a particular moment that is crucially important: 1886. It was then that Durand-Ruel accepted an invitation to bring over 300 paintings to an exhibition in New York. This proved to be a milestone in American art. In response, American artists flocked to the French village of Giverny – home to master impressionist Claude Monet. American artists cheered the French new wave: painting outdoors with a brilliant palette. Europe recoiled against the work of Monet, Degas, Manet, etc.. Americans embraced it – and created their own style of impressionism. This was a story that, frankly, I didn’t know. We are so used to hearing about the “French” impressionists that we barely mention other European impressionists, never mind Americans, Australians and others. What fascinated me immediately about the American angle was how it could offer an insight into not only American art history but American history in general. Art naturally reflects its time. So I knew this would be more than a film about transferring a particular artistic style to a different continent. This would be a film about how this movement was taken up and incorporated into a period of American history that was transforming the nation. So I and my team looked into what exhibitions were coming up and that’s where we had the great fortune to discover a major and already successful exhibition entitled ‘The Artist’s Garden – American Impressionism and the Garden Movement’. It had begun in Philadelphia at the wonderful Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts and then moved on – reaching a conclusion at the Florence Griswold Museum in Old Lyme. That’s where we filmed it. We were extremely fortunate to secure the opportunity to work with both the Florence Griswold and the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts – and to have available the curator of the original show (and editor of the catalogue) Anna O. Marley and the curator, Amy Kurtz Lansing, and assistant curator, Jennifer Stettler Parsons, of the latter exhibition. I hope you enjoy watching the film as much as we did making it." Phil Grabsky, Director

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