Behold the Beauty: Early American Still Life Flower Paintings

Nineteenth-century painter Severin Roesen was one of the artists who brought the European flower painting tradition to the nation. 

Flower Still Life With Bird's Nest,” 1853, by Severin Roesen. Oil on canvas; 40 inches by 32 inches. Philadelphia Museum of Art, Purchased with support from the Henry P. McIlhenny Fund in memory of Frances P. McIlhenny, Mr. and Mrs. Robert L. McNeil, Jr., the Edith H. Bell Fund, Mrs. J. Maxwell Moran, Marguerite and Gerry Lenfest, the Center for American Art Fund, Donna C. and Morris W. Stroud II, Dr. and Mrs. Robert E. Booth, Jr., Frederick LaValley and John Whitenight, Mr. and Mrs. John A. Nyheim, Charlene Sussel, Penelope P. Wilson, the American Art Committee, and with the gift (by exchange) of Theodore Wiedemann in memory of his wife, Letha M. Wiedemann. Courtesy of the Philadelphia Museum of Art

Prussian American Severin Roesen (1816–circa 1872) helped make still-life painting blossom in mid-19th-century America. The artist emigrated with his wife, along with a wave of Prussians during the German Revolutions of 1848 and 1849. Mainly working in Williamsport, Pennsylvania, he established himself as one of the artists who introduced the tradition of still life flower painting to the country, painting more than 300 works. 

Roesen’s bountiful still life paintings burst forth with ripe fruit and often fanciful floral bouquets, such as in “Flower Still Life With Bird’s Nest.” In this piece, he rendered a glistening glass vase, and bugs and butterflies that hover among familiar leaves, and blooms, including cabbage rose, camelia, chrysanthemum, daylily, delphinium, German iris, lilac, morning glory, nasturtium, peony poppy, pincushion flower, pink tea rose, primrose, Queen Anne’s lace, red and white rosa mundi, striped tulip, all topped with a crown imperial. It’s a fanciful arrangement, as some of these flowers don’t blossom simultaneously in nature. 

European Still Life Flower Painting 

One can trace the trajectory of still life flower paintings over the centuries through Roesen’s fantastical painting “Flower Still Life With Bird’s Nest.”