Mennello Museum of American Art, Oct 21

I had a free Saturday afternoon so I thought it would be the perfect time to visit a new art museum in Orlando (new to me, that is), the Mennello Museum of American Art. It was a very small art museum, only six galleries, and two of those were actually just hallways with a few paintings hung. But is was nice, none the less. They even had a sculpture garden on the property. That was also small, I think I counted less than a dozen sculptures, but the grounds were nice and it had the benefit of a lake as the back drop.


Every time I go to a museum I like to select my all time favorite of the trip. This time it was Newell Convers Wyeth's Buttonwood Farm, 1920, oil on canvas.

The colors and the contrast don't come through on the photo as they do when viewing it in person. The blues and the greens immediately attracted me. Many of the American landscapes in that gallery were of the west and were quite dark. This one called to me. The Buttonwood farm, it turns out, is a real place. It's in on the site of the Brandywine Battlefield State Park near Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania. I'll have to visit one of these days!

Here is the info on the painting:
Since I liked the painting so much, I did some research on who N. C. Wyeth was and found out he was actually more of an illustrator than an artist. He did illustrations for magazines, books, and even advertisements. They say he had aspirations of being a "real" artist, but from the vast amount of work he completed, he was a very successful illustrator. And to me, those drawings looked like true works of art themselves!! 








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