Mill River Scenery

Currier & Ives|Frances Flora Bond Palmer

1857–68 · Hand-colored lithograph · Drawings and Prints

In this vertical river landscape, a stream powers the wheel of a wooden mill. A man, dressed in a red jacket and carrying a white sack, enters the mill. Tall trees and vegetation grow along the left river bank, with ducks on the shore and in the water. In the central background, there is are farm buildings with mountains beyond. When Frances "Fanny" Flora Bond Palmer moved to New York from England in 1844 she was thirty-two and an accomplished artist and printmaker. Initially, Fanny and her husband Seymour operated a small print-shop in lower Manhattan, similar to one they had run in Leicester (United Kingdom). In 1849, the couple moved to Brooklyn after the business closed. Nathaniel Currier recognized Palmer’s talent and began to buy her drawings to use as print designs. After Currier & Ives was established in 1857 she became a staff artist. 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, particularly admired for her serene landscapes.

Artist

Currier & Ives|Frances Flora Bond Palmer

Date

1857–68

Medium

Hand-colored lithograph

Department

Drawings and Prints

Credit line

Gift of A. S. Colgate, 1951