"It is unclear when the first American artist visited Giverny, and uncertain, too, what motivated that initial visit. We do know that long before the railroad was built, neighboring Vernon was a coach station on the way to Paris. As early as August 1774 the Boston painter John Singleton Copley dined in Vernon en route to Paris from England, after having passed through Dieppe and Rouen. Many other American artists undoubtedly traveled through the region along a similar route, but it was not until over a hundred years later that American artists first came to visit and to stay at Giverny." (W. H. Gerdts, Monet's Giverny: An Impressionist Colony, New York, 1993, p. 21)
Born aboard a clipper ship in the South Pacific, the son of a captain in the United States Navy, John Leslie Breck was educated in boarding schools in the Boston area. His formal art training was typical of the emerging American Impressionist group; after initial study in the United States, he was sent to Europe to finish his education. In 1878 Breck enrolled at the Royal Academy in Munich. On a second sojourn to Europe in the 1880's, he enrolled at the Académie Julian in Paris, where training emphasized traditional drawing and modeling. Breck was one of the first American painters to arrive in Giverny in 1885, two years before the founding of the celebrated art colony in 1887.
The time that Breck spent painting in Giverny had a profound influence on the direction of his painting. "Breck was primarily a Tonal landscape painter, but in the five years that he lived in close proximity to Monet, the undisputed master of the garden picture, he produced a number of dazzling, highly Impressionistic garden painting. Garden at Giverny (In Monet's Garden), c. 1887, and Garden at Giverny, c. 1890, are fine examples of Breck's new high-keyed, lusciously textured style. Alternating broad strokes of paint with feathery touches, he builds up the dense garden growth. It is likely that these paintings were in Breck's first one-person show, which took place in Boston at the St. Botolph Club in 1890. Although critical reaction was generally negative-the works being considered too radical-the garden paintings elicited excitement." (Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, Lasting Impressions: American Painters in France, 1865-1915, Chicago, Illinois, 1992, p. 146)
Breck emerged from Giverny as one of the most influential members of the Boston Impressionist circle. He painted Flower Garden at Annisquam after his return to New England from Europe in 1892. Breck left Giverny for good after the summer of 1891, during which he had become romantically involved with one of Monet's stepdaughters, Blanche Hoschedé. Monet disapproved of the union and successfully discouraged it, perhaps prompting Breck's departure for England that fall. After painting the Kentish countryside and exhibiting at the New English Art Club in 1892, the artist returned to the United States.
Back in America, Breck found inspiration in various scenic Massachusetts locations. The village of Annisquam, located on Cape Ann near Gloucester in Massachusetts, was a popular location with artists in the later decades of the nineteenth century. In Flower Garden at Annisquam, lush summer blooms in vibrant colors seem to burst from the canvas, reflecting the best of Breck's Impressionist technique as he applied it to a distinctly American garden landscape.