 |
 I
thought I'd start today with some work by a special guest artist:
my mum, Joan Bell. She drew this as a card to go
with a voucher for Armitage's art shop in Ossett that she gave me
for my birthday recently.
She says that the design was inspired by Catherine Hamilton's
illustrations to the England is a Garden series. Hamilton
would set out with her caravan to various parts of the country,
for example the Lake  District,
to draw the wild flowers, garden flowers, landscapes and traditional
buildings that give a particular region its character. Typically
she would paint the flowers in watercolour and add a background
in pencil.
I'd like that job!
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Garden Posy
The evenings are now getting too light to use a candle on the dinner
table so when my mum, my sister Lin and her husband Dave, came around
for a meal yesterday I went down the garden with a small jug and
picked a selection of flowers (including the odd weed): |
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| Aubretia
Bush Vetch
Anemone blanda
Pansy
Kingcups
Violet
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Lily of the Valley
Hellebore
Forget-me-not
London Pride
Elephant's Ears
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The Art of Botanical Painting
 When
I went browsing around the art shop with the token my mum had given me
I came across this book by Margaret Stevens, produced
in association with the Society of Botanical Artists. I'd like to immerse
myself in natural history again this summer and this book appeals to me;
it's not too coldly scientific like some books on botanical illustration
nor is it airily elegant like some of the flowers painting guides that
I've seen. The scientific approach might involve stultifyingly precise
stippled pen and ink work while at the other extreme - the more painterly
approach - blooms might dissolve into misty ripples of watercolour.
I guess I could learn a lot from both ends of the botanical art spectrum
but The Art of Botanical Painting appeals to me as a starting
point because it strikes a balance - relaxed but rigorous - between the
two extremes.
It includes 14 step-by-step demonstrations and I think that if I try
painting my own versions of these, using fresh flowers and fruits as subjects,
as I read through the book it will serve as a useful refresher course
for me. 
Related Link
Collins
who publish The
Art of Botanical Painting
Richard Bell, richard@willowisland.co.uk
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