Landscape – Fruit and Flowers

This splendid still life and landscape vista was among the most notable and popular original print compositions that Frances "Fanny" Flora Bond Palmer created for the celebrated lithography firm Currier & Ives. Featuring a glorious arrangement of beautiful flowers in a blue-patterned white vase (trimmed in gold), containers of red berries, bunches of grapes and other fruit placed on a table set on a balcony, there is also a grand view of New York's Hudson River scenery. Beyond a hummingbird flying towards a trumpet vine on a trellis, a viewer can glimpse a lone house in a valley, boats sailing on the river beyond, and distant mountains.

Nathaniel Currier, who established a successful New York-based lithography firm in 1835, produced thousands of hand-colored prints in various sizes that together create a vivid panorama of mid-to-late nineteenth century American life. Expansion led, in 1857, to a partnership with James Merritt Ives (1824–1895), the accountant brother-in-law of Nathaniel's brother Charles. People eagerly acquired Currier & Ives lithographs, such as those featuring spectacular American landscapes, rural and city views, hunting and fishing scenes, domestic life and numerous other subjects, as an inexpensive way to decorate their homes or business establishments.


When Fanny Palmer arrived in New York from England in 1844, she was already an accomplished artist and printmaker. Initially, Fanny and her husband Seymour operated a small printshop in lower Manhattan, similar to one they had run in Leicester in the United Kingdom. In 1849, the couple moved to Brooklyn after closing their business. Nathaniel Currier began to buy print designs from Palmer around this time, and she became a staff artist for Currier & Ives after 1857. As a designer able to transfer images to lithographic stones for printing, Palmer produced more than 200 prints for the firm and today is regarded as a leading woman lithographer of the period. Although it was unusual for a woman to achieve such prominence in a printing firm, Palmer filled an important role for Currier and Ives firm, as she created the firm's best landscapes and most engaging scenes of daily life.