Geese and Hollyhocks

In Geese and Hollyhocks, Jessie Arms Botke filled nearly the entire composition with flowers and vegetation, creating a painting with striking decorative effects. Embedded in the flora, four geese stretch across the shallow foreground, the overlapping, undulating shapes of their long necks and bodies introducing a sense of movement. Born in Chicago, Botke studied at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She worked in New York for several years at the textile firm Herter Looms, where she produced designs for tapestries and decorative panels, and later relocated to California. Botke also executed numerous mural commissions. The artist specialized in renderings of birds, drawing inspiration from Japanese aesthetics such as woodblock prints.