Maréchal Niel Roses

Childe Hassam, Maréchal Niel Roses, 1919, oil on canvas, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of John Gellatly, 1929.6.58
Copied Childe Hassam, Maréchal Niel Roses, 1919, oil on canvas, 26 1⁄2 x 32 5⁄8 in. (67.2 x 82.8 cm.), Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of John Gellatly, 1929.6.58
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Artwork Details

Title
Maréchal Niel Roses
Artist
Date
1919
Location
Dimensions
26 1⁄2 x 32 5⁄8 in. (67.2 x 82.8 cm.)
Credit Line
Gift of John Gellatly
Mediums
Mediums Description
oil on canvas
Classifications
Subjects
  • Object — flower — rose
  • Object — art object — painting
  • Figure female — waist length
  • State of being — mood — meditation
Object Number
1929.6.58
Linked Open Data
https://edan.si.edu/saam/id/object/1929.6.58

Artwork Description

Childe Hassam posed a young model at a mahogany table with two vases of Maréchal Niel roses, a flower named for Napoléon III’s secretary of war. Hassam believed that people were shaped by their environments, and here the hybrid roses symbolize America’s culture, which he thought had absorbed the best elements of European and Asian history. The two women in the painting, a blonde and a brunette, similarly evoke different “strains” that had blended to create an American hybrid of womanhood.