Sketch for an illustration for Selections from the Poetry of Robert Herrick 1882

Editor: This is a sketch for an illustration titled "Selections from the Poetry of Robert Herrick" by Edwin Austin Abbey, created in 1882. It combines drawing and watercolor. There's something about the muted colors and floral imagery that feels both celebratory and a little melancholic. How do you interpret this work? Curator: Oh, that melancholic beauty, you feel it too? It whispers of Herrick's own blend of earthly pleasures and the inevitable fade. I see Abbey using the Art Nouveau style, bending nature to frame poetry. Look at the sun, how it almost *weeps* light, framed not with hard lines but a swirling kind of aura. Tell me, does it remind you of anything outside of art, perhaps something felt, smelled even? Editor: Now that you mention it, that sun-like flower has a very specific feel to it. It smells of the late summer and autumn days when flowers die…I wonder, why the choice to put words in the very art? Curator: Isn’t that clever? Here we are, drawn in by the blooms and gentle lines only to have our minds engaged with the text. Words become art. A garden of verses. Abbey almost invites us to imagine each letter blossoming too. Like they say the rose is a rose; is a letter an art if viewed so? What does art want from us, anyway, if not engagement. Editor: It really does change how I see the text! I thought it was just a title, but now it's part of the entire feel of the image, flowers, setting sun and everything! Thank you for your time! Curator: Thanks to you too, friend, now when the setting sun strikes and paints an ageing rose; you and I both shall think, now doesn't that resemble Edwin Abbey's vision!