How did the American public come to understand and appreciate picturesque aesthetics in both domestic and public landscapes? Andrew Jackson Downing, horticulturalist, landscape designer and tastemaker, exerted his influence on American landscape culture from the middle- class suburbanite who followed Downing’s published plans for villas, cottages and gardens, to the urban dwellers who experienced Downing’s ideas as they were translated by Frederick Law Olmsted in his design for New York City’s Central Park.

 

SERIES OVERVIEW: This three-part series conducted by art historian, Julie Levin Caro, explores the various visual and cultural contexts surrounding the Hudson River school of landscape painting.