Spring 1890

Thomas Wilmer Dewing created this oil painting, Spring, in the United States sometime in the late nineteenth century. It encapsulates many of the cultural tensions of the Gilded Age. On the one hand, the painting displays the conservative tendencies of institutions like the National Academy, which prized academic skill and idealized beauty. But Dewing's choice of subject—leisurely women enjoying nature—and his soft, muted palette also speak to the period’s changing social norms. The Aesthetic movement, which influenced Dewing, questioned the values of industrial capitalism and emphasized beauty. These women inhabit an idyllic, pre-industrial world, far from the factories and crowded cities that were transforming American society. As art historians, we can look to period sources like women's magazines and exhibition reviews to understand how Dewing's contemporaries viewed his work. Was he seen as offering an escape from the modern world, or as challenging its values? Such questions help us to understand the complex relationship between art and society.