Many botanical artists took note of the beautiful United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) catalog of American fruits and nuts when it was published in 2021 by Atelier Editions. The catalog contains selections from the 7,500 watercolor paintings commissioned by USDA’s Division of Pomology from 1886 to 1942.  In addition to apples, which comprise over half of the USDA’s watercolor collection, it contains citrus, berries, melons, and drupes, even nuts, and it illuminated the work of  many female artists.

Because my final project in the Wellesley Friends Botanical Program is apples, I bought the book immediately. (Continued…)

As botanical artists, we continually search for inspiration to feed our creative endeavors. We don’t have to always search very far - within NESBA’s members we have so many talented artists

September is a time of many transitions - summer turns to fall, school begins, work replaces vacations - and NESBA held its annual meeting on September 15. The Board of Directors noted our solid financial position, our robust membership of 220, this past year’s programming highlights and the work of the Exhibits Task Force…

How blue can it get? How deep can it be? Some years ago, at the Guggenheim Bilbao, I thought I’d hit on the ultimate blue, displayed on the gallery floor. Yves Klein, who died at thirty-four, was obsessed with purging color of any external associations. Gestural abstraction, he felt, was clotted with sentimental extraneousness. But, in search of chromatic purity, Klein realized that even the purest pigments’ intensity dulled when combined with a binder such as oil, egg, or acrylic. In 1960, he commissioned a synthetic binder that would resist the absorption of light waves, delivering maximum reflectiveness. Until that day in Bilbao, I’d thought Klein a bit of a monomaniacal bore, but Klein International Blue, as he named the pigment—rolled out flat or pimpled, with saturated sponges embedded in the paint surface—turned my eyeballs inside out, rods and cones jiving with joy. This is it, I thought. It can’t get any bluer.

CLICK HERE FOR MORE OF THE STORY :Treasures from the Color Archive: The New Yorker

As a budding botanical artist I agonized over my artistic signature, ie. How to sign my name. Spending hours researching a plant, drawing and painting its portrait it now came down to the final aspect of signing my artwork. So I did some homework.

Tower Hill Botanic Garden: A Must-See Destination for Botanical Artists

By Ellen Duarte

Last fall I offered a class at in nature journaling at a local art center. I had only dabbled in journaling in response to my interest in edible wild plants. But when planning to teach a broader perspective, I was delighted at the possibilities. During the six week course, we touched on plants and flowers, trees, birds, and butterflies, and utilized graphite, colored pencil, ink and, of course, watercolor. It is almost overwhelming what can be included in a nature journal, but what a thrill!

Color: Challenges and Rewards By Susan Fulton

Looking out my window at the snow covered subdued outdoor palette of winter, it is hard to believe that in a short time spring will arrive with its glorious bulbs, flowering trees, and emerging buds. There is something uplifting and joyous about being outside enjoying the riotous colors of spring. Clear bright color has long attracted observers to art—Titian was known as a “colorist” of great renown and the Impressionists, who used bright colors on a white canvas, continue to draw large crowds of observers. Modern botanical artists are pushing the boundaries of traditional plant portraits by presenting larger and more lush interpretations of plants in a wider variety of mediums. Deciding how to illustrate a plant and what colors to use are some of the biggest challenges facing us as botanical artists. Realistic color applied in a way that mimics a plant is one of the objectives, but how to achieve this in a painting?

A wonderful thing about living in New England is the annual seasonal changes that come almost like clockwork. Spring, summer, and fall bring the natural world to life. Green becomes a dominant landscape color. Garden perennials and native wildflowers begin to grow. Bulbs pop through the soil after a long-needed rest. Trees and woody shrubs blossom. Summer brings blooms of glorious colors from gardens to hills, and valleys, and even the seashore. Then comes fall, with it’s stunning foliage in every shade of red, orange and gold. The days get cooler and shorter until one can’t ignore what’s coming : winter, the season of grays and browns.

Inspiration

By Anne Brownlee-Fisher

Spotlight on: Wave Hill

In 2018 and again in 2020 Wave Hill hosted the 21st and 23rd Annual International respectively, a juried exhibition of American Society of Botanical Artists, hosting works from May thru December 6th, 2020. Described as an 'oasis in the Bronx' by the New York Times, Wave Hill is an unconventional museum comprised of a nature sanctuary, performance venues, along with indoor and outdoor art exhibition areas. According to its website, "Wave Hill is a museum without walls with a living collection of more than 4,000 varieties of trees, shrubs, vines, and herbaceous plants.' Its 28 acre site hosts formal gardens, an 8 acre woodland, greenhouses, a conservatory, and multi-use indoor spaces.