American Art Collaborative

This composition shows a white-flowering pear tree in the center, with the bright yellow flowers of forsythia bushes in the background. The building just visible beyond the foliage is Porter's home in Southampton, New York, which was the setting for many of his paintings. The natural environment featured prominently in Porter's work, and he and his brother, the photographer Eliot Porter, were keen environmental campaigners. The critic Hilton Kramer coined the phrase "the art of conservation" in reference to Porter's painting, and compared his position in the art world to the place "our parks and gardens and surviving areas of unmolested countryside stand in relation to our overdeveloped urban centers." (Spike, Fairfield Porter: An American Classic, 1992