TheOld Lyme art colony ofOld Lyme, Connecticut was established in 1899 by American painterHenry Ward Ranger, and was in its time the most famous art colony in the United States, and the first to adopt Impressionism.[1]
Ranger began his American equivalent to the FrenchBarbizon school, a similar seasonal retreat from less bucolic communities, in the modest boarding house ofFlorence Griswold, bringing fellow artists Lewis Cohen,Henry Rankin Poore,Louis Paul Dessar, andWilliam Henry Howe in 1900. The group came to be dominated, socially and artistically, byChilde Hassam after his appearance in 1903.[2]
The colony was important to the development ofAmerican Impressionism. Perhaps 200 painters passed through the colony during its height in the next 30 years.[3] Many significant American Impressionist paintings of the era depict buildings in and around Old Lyme, notably theOld Lyme Congregational Church, painted by Hassam and others. The 1906 paintingMay Night byWillard Metcalf shows the boardinghouse by night, with a figure said to be Griswold herself. This was the first contemporary painting purchased by theCorcoran Gallery of Art.
Old Lyme remains a thriving art community. The Griswold House has been transformed into an art museum, theFlorence Griswold Museum, affectionately called "Flo Gris", by local residents. The museum holds artists' work along with personal possessions of the artists who frequented there.
Artists of the Old Lyme art colony include: