A new exhibition at George Eastman Museum, in Rochester NY, US invites visitors to rediscover Edward Steichen through an unexpected perspective: his lifelong relationship with gardens, plants, and botanical experimentation. ‘Edward Steichen and the Garden‘, on view from March 27 to September 6, 2026, offers a fresh portrait of one of photography’s most influential figures by revealing how deeply nature informed his creative vision.

Widely celebrated for shaping the history of modern photography over a career that spanned seven decades, Steichen is less frequently associated with horticulture. Yet gardening occupied a central place in his life for decades, becoming both a personal refuge and a parallel artistic practice. The exhibition demonstrates how this dedication to plants was not separate from his visual work, but instead an essential force that influenced his artistic development.

According to curator Sarah Anne McNear, the project began with an interest in understanding Steichen as a gardener, but quickly evolved into a broader exploration of how plant breeding intersected with his photography and painting. Her research reveals that Steichen approached horticulture with the same intensity and inventiveness that defined his photographic career, seeing plant cultivation as another form of artistic creation.

A major focus of the exhibition is Steichen’s pioneering work with delphiniums. Through years of genetic experimentation and hybridization, he developed original varieties of the flower and argued that plant breeding itself should be understood as a creative art form. His achievements gained international recognition, and in 1936 his extraordinary delphiniums were exhibited at Museum of Modern Art, an unusual moment in which horticulture entered one of the world’s leading art institutions. The presentation helped establish him as the most celebrated delphinium breeder in the United States.

The exhibition also reflects the strong archival connection between Steichen and the Eastman Museum. Over the years, the museum has received important donations from Steichen’s estate and family members, creating substantial holdings of photographs, documents, and archival materials that now support new scholarship on his work. Museum director Bruce Barnes notes that this made the institution a natural home for the exhibition, particularly because Steichen’s horticultural interests echo those of George Eastman himself, who also maintained a deep passion for gardening.

Objects from the museum’s own collections are presented alongside major loans from institutions including Philadelphia Museum of Art, Phillips Collection, and Block Museum of Art. Together, these works trace Steichen’s lifelong dialogue with nature across photography, painting, and plant cultivation.

The exhibition is accompanied by a hardcover publication authored by McNear and co-published with Yale University Press, expanding the research behind the show for a wider audience. After its Rochester presentation, the exhibition will travel to Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in 2027, followed by Reynolda House Museum of American Art.

More than a biographical exhibition, Edward Steichen and the Garden reveals how nature functioned as both laboratory and inspiration, showing that for Steichen, the garden was never simply a backdrop, but a vital creative space