Synopsis
In this beautifully illustrated and elegantly written book, Stephanie Ross explores the magical lure of gardens. Paying special attention to the landscape gardens of eighteenth-century England, Ross situates gardening among other fine arts, documenting the complex messages gardens can convey and tracing connections between gardens and the art of painting.
Library Journal
Ross (philosophy, Univ. of Missouri, St. Louis) asks whether a garden can be a work of art. Beginning by surveying recent theories about the nature and boundaries of art, she then devotes a chapter to the history and sources of 18th-century English landscape gardens, questioning whether they can be considered works of art. She investigates why gardening did not develop the same organizational structure as other arts, resulting in royal academies such as those formed in France and England for the visual arts. Ross writes in an academic style that makes her book read like a doctoral dissertation, with lists of points to be proven or disputed and extensive definitions of terms. Except in her innovative last chapter, in which she posits that gardens transmuted into 20th-century earthworks and environmental art, Ross limits her discussions to large landscape gardens. Within this strict limitation, her observations are insightful, especially about English landscape gardens, but this book is more a study of aesthetics than of gardens. For academic libraries only.Daniel Starr, Museum of Modern Art, New York