Alfred Quinton Collins (1855 - 1903, Cambridge, Massachusetts)
Japanese Irises, 1893
Oil on canvas, 68.5 x 56 cm (26 15/16 x 22 1/16 in.)
This vertical impressionistic painting captures four loosely rendered white irises in front of three lavender and purple irises behind, all against a background sea of blue, green and yellow stems and long, slender leaves. Some of the stems are dark blue topped which may suggest incipient buds of not-yet-open deep bluish-purple irises. The sense of movement from the verticality of the stems contrasts with the stability of the luminous white irises in front and the purple ones behind.
Vatichino
Commentary
Alfred Quinton Collins, a Boston painter more known for portraiture, painted these irises in Isabella’s gardens at Green Hill. At Green Hill, the Gardner family’s 40-acre estate in Brookline, Massachusetts, Isabella and her lead gardener, Charles Montague Atkinson, were particularly skilled at creating successful displays of hard-to-grow plants. They succeeded in growing a tender variety of Japanese iris by starting the delicate plants indoors and then irrigating the outdoor beds with warm water from her greenhouse.