Artists’ Stories

Rowan

Sorbus aucuparia – Nicola Macartney

Rowan growing beside Loch Tay © Nicola Macartney

I have always been fascinated by Rowan trees. It is maybe something about their place in Scottish folklore that I like. They are reputed to be trees which offer protection against witchcraft and enchantment – not generally a big concern these days. Nevertheless, I had to remove one from my garden a few years ago and I was told that it was bad luck and I should plant another!

They have long been a part of the Scottish landscape and the gaelic for rowan which is caorunn appears in several Highland place names. Another reminder of the relationship between plants and our everyday lives.

The rowan I painted is one growing in a garden on the south shore of Loch Tay. I think it must have been a good year for rowans as the trees were full of berries. The colours were amazing and I was struck by the variety of differing shades in the leaves and berries on different trees – from blue greens to bright spring greens and from orange to pillar box reds.

Returning to my studio, I set about drawing out a branch. I chose a specimen that seemed to embody the rowan’s exuberant growth with leaves sprouting in all directions and a large number of berries. I decided to paint the branch at 2 times life size as I felt that this would accentuate the impact of the bright colours and vigorous growth.

Work in progress © Nicola Macartney

I chose a composition where the berries were coming forward because it created a pleasing shape and allowed a view of the lower berries which I hoped would give a sense of their weight.

Colour matching for Rowan © Nicola Macartney

I always use a fairly limited palette. In this painting I used two yellows, new gamboge and windsor lemon, a few reds but mainly pyrrol scarlet and permanent rose and for the blues, windsor blue, aquamarine and indigo. Colour matching is always tricky when the painting takes longer than the specimen survives.  Luckily, I had taken the advice given to me and had planted a rowan tree in my garden which gave me a living reference. Maybe not quite protection from enchantment and witchcraft but hopefully protection from bad colour choices!

 

See more of Nicola’s work at:

www.nicolamacartney.com
facebook.com/NicolaMacartneyIllustration

 

Solomon’s Seal

Polygonatum multiflorum – Victoria Braithwaite

Solomon’s Seal – In Situ © Victoria Braithwaite
I’ve always loved the understated elegance and rhythm of this plant, which grows happily in my mother’s garden amongst the vinca, snowdrops and sweet woodruff . I was therefore very glad to see ‘Solomon’s Seal’ on the plant list and be given the opportunity (and push) to finally paint it.
It’s definitely not my usual sort of subject (Green! Leaves! Oh my!), so it was a challenge in several different ways. This was also the first time I’ve painted to scale, and measuring was definitely not my favourite part of the preparation.
First Sketch © Victoria Braithwaite
I’ve often sketched this plant, and will probably paint it again in different stages, as the emerging shoots are stunning and very occasionally (maybe twice in my memory, so this might be a very long-term plan) it weathers to a glorious skeleton.
I planted some in my own garden with the intention of having a living specimen to hand, but it turns out that young plants are much, much smaller than mature clumps, so rather than painting my own ‘bonsai’ version, I made several trips to the original plant.
© Victoria Braithwaite
I took hundreds of photographs over three sessions, and played for quite a while with composition sketches, finally deciding to keep it very simple.  I carried this simplicity through to the palette, using only three colours (WN transparent yellow, DS indanthrone blue, WN permanent alizarin crimson). 
In progress © Victoria Braithwaite
© Victoria Braithwaite

There were several characteristics of the plant which I wanted to highlight in the final painting – the dramatic difference in both texture and colour between the underside and the top of the leaves, the way that low late winter sunlight glows through them, and the springy nature, almost wing-like, that the leaves have as they grow from the stem.  I’m unsure how successful I was with this in the execution, but I like to have a vague idea of the final effect in mind as I pootle along!

Shetland Monkeyflower

Mimulus guttatus (4x) – Janet Watson

Shetland Monkeyflower in progress © Janet Watson

It was from the 6pm BBC news broadcast on Wed. August 16th 2017 that I first heard and saw a new type of Shetland monkeyflower discovered at Quarff in Shetland. The following day I read a newspaper article about it and its discoverer, Dr Mario Vallejo-Marin, an associate professor from Stirling University. Many years earlier, I myself had completed a PhD on evolution at Stirling University so I phoned him to express my interest and to ask if he had thought of having this attractive plant painted by a botanical artist. Following his invitation, I met him at Stirling University the following day.

Imagine our surprise when we discovered the my PhD supervisor in 1968 (Dr Janis Antonovics – now FRS) was also Mario’s PhD supervisor at Duke University, North Carolina many years later! What a small world!

Mario showed me the monkeyflower growing in the growth chamber and also a plant he had flown to Shetland to collect for the BBC and newspaper publicity. They had insisted that they have photographs of a plant grown in Shetland. He had brought it back on the plane in hand luggage.

It is thought that this new form of Shetland monkeyflower is a tetraploid form of Mimulus guttatus which has evolved in a small area of Shetland over the last 200 years from a North American species which spread through Britain in the 1800s.The plant is tall and very striking with beautiful yellow flowers with small red dots dissimilar from the typical monkeyflower. The leaf margins are also dissimilar.

Mario asked me to go ahead with the painting and he gave me the plant that he brought back from Shetland viz. a flowering stem that had rooted. When I received it at lunchtime on Friday 18th August, it had 3 flowers, one of which was about to drop off, a bud and a stem with paired, curved leaves and a side shoot. I realised very quickly that this would be a challenge. By teatime, the flower had fallen off and by Saturday teatime, the other two flowers had fallen off! Meantime, I had taken a lot of photos, a lot of measurements, I had completed dissections of the flowers and several drawings and colour matchings. I had also placed pollen from the fallen flowers on to the stigmas left behind on the stem. I was fascinated to see the sides of the stigma close together over the pollen about 5-10 minutes later. The fruits which develop are a very striking shape and colour.

The work continued apace. I completed a painting of the flowering stem and side shoot but I had been sent an image of the RBGE herbarium specimen. The lower leaves of the plant were 4 times larger than the leaves on the upper part of the flowering stem and it was difficult to determine the growth habit of the lower leaves. As I was to be the first to paint this ‘new’ unusual plant, I thought I should make a more complete painting showing the roots, the lower parts of the plant and flower dissections as well as the flowering shoot with its side shoot. For this, I was given a huge pot containing just 1 plant with many roots and many shoots with the larger lower leaves. The growth habit of these leaves is so different from that of the upper leaves.

Several weeks later I completed the painting. The Shetland monkeyflower is a very handsome plant and I thoroughly enjoyed the many challenges it presented. Mario and I are so delighted that the painting is to be displayed in the exhibition and the book.

Sutherland Kale

Brassica napus – Lizzie Sanders

Sutherland Kale in progress © Lizzie Sanders

I wanted to paint something big and bold. I had previously been working on a full size painting of ‘Cavolo nero’ so I started to investigate Scottish native vegetables.

‘Sutherland Kale’ was suggested and last May I found someone with an allotment at Inverleith who was growing a couple of plants. She kindly agreed to my drawing her plants and taking lots of photos over a period of weeks.

I also contacted The Real Seed Company and bought some seeds to grow my own plants. On their website, they explained that this particular variety (“Càil Cataibh” in Gaelic) had its origins in Sutherland where it was grown by local crofters.  Not only does it produce lovely, tender green leaves, it is also very resilient, capable of fending off aphids, caterpillars, ravenous goats, and 70 mph freezing sleet!

Sutherland Kale grows waist high and is cooked in a very similar way to spinach.  When it starts to bolt in spring, the flowering shoots can also be eaten, very much like sprouting broccoli shoots.

Piecing it all together © Lizzie Sanders

The original plants were several feet tall so the painting would take up a whole sheet of paper (1000 x 700 mm). As I didn’t have a whole specimen in the studio I started piecing together dozens of tracing paper drawings of separate leaves, stems and flowers. This got so complicated that when I came to transfer it to watercolour paper, I had to use coloured markers to define which parts I had already worked on.

© Lizzie Sanders

I painted all the leaves first, leaving the stems white until near the end; then the buds and flowers before joining all together with the stems. Finally I completed the lumpy brown lower stem and roots.

My painting technique is usually fine dry-brush – which is what I’ve mostly used here. However, as the deadline for hand-in loomed closer and closer I had to speed up and started to use more water than I usually do. I always keep a record of my painting hours – this piece has taken 375 hours!

Many thanks to Kathy Parker whose kale I drew and painted.

 

For the full story about the history of the Real Seed’s Sutherland Kale, have a look at the following:

http://www.realseeds.co.uk/kale.html

For more interesting facts about Sutherland Kale including how it is related to cabbage, turnip and mustard, see this article on the RBGE web page:

https://stories.rbge.org.uk/archives/15360

Coltsfoot

Tussilago farfara – Eleanor Christopher

This painting is dedicated to  Mr Al Bowley who taught me ‘O’ and ‘A’ level biology (30 years ago!). In one of Al’s letters to me he wrote “When I was 5 years old and on my way to school I was fascinated by the first Spring flower that I’d see. It grew in clumps on chalk grassland. In time the flower developed into a dandelion-type ‘clock’. The leaves did not come out until the flower had finished. These early flowers stimulated a love of botany which I have enjoyed all my life”.

Thumbnail sketches © Eleanor Christopher

I was quite astounded by the notion of a simple plant inspiring and directing the course of one’s life. I had to confess that I had never heard of or seen this flower before. My teacher, though long retired, was still teaching!

Commonly known as Coltsfoot, I learnt it was a native Scottish plant, favouring poor soils and sunny locations, often found beside ditches and streams or on compacted, gravelly paths. Then the opportunity to contribute to Flora Scotia for a Worldwide exhibition sharpened my focus and got my creative juices going! I resolved to keep an eye out for likely places in which it could grow on my walking circuit in South Edinburgh.

One April morning, my vigilance paid off. I found a large patch growing on wasteland beside a busy road, adjacent to a ploughed field. I was delighted with my discovery!

It is daunting to be faced with a white, smooth, empty page. There are so many questions to be answered before ever making a mark!

The Internet is a useful starting point to see other artists’ approach to composition and style – historical and con!temporary. I learnt the value of this during my 2 year Botanical Illustration Diploma course at the Royal Botanic Gardens Edinburgh. Another useful technique practised on this course was plant dissection, using a white tile and scalpel. This answers questions like ‘what goes on inside the very heart of the flower or seed head? What part is attached to what and how? Exactly how many stamens are there, and what shape is the carpel?’

I like to start with an overall picture in my mind’s eye of the finished painting before making any paint marks. I find if useful to do thumbnail sketches of my composition on scraps of paper. If a 2” square scribble doesn’t look pleasing, then it’s unlikely that an A2 or A4 piece using this layout would be any better.

My finished composition could be described as ‘disruptive’. 2 flower heads are on the verge of opening and ‘having a conversation with each other’ whilst being overlooked by the drooping elder head. The fully opened ‘in it’s prime’ flower head is looking out of the page. This is the nature of ‘weeds’/ wild flowers. They can be disruptive – turning up where they’re not invited or they can disrupt a barren landscape and provide pockets of beauty.

Test pieces © Eleanor Christopher

I take photos of my subject mostly for peace of mind. I fear the plant will keel over before my painting is complete and having a static reference is a nice backup. I colour match from the actual plant itself and not from photos. I mix my colours for each part that I’m currently working on, and do test pieces on paper I’m using for the final piece (50% cotton watercolour Hotpressed paper Botanical Ultra smooth in this instance). I do this in my studio and then bring the plant and colour swatches outside to look at them in daylight. The match has to be perfect!

I am fascinated by the permanent rose and magenta colours of the first emerging buds from the soil surface that are covered in a thin cobweb-like mesh. I didn’t think I’d be using such colours for a plant I had assumed to be predominantly yellows and greens. This is detail you’d never see during an ordinary walk in the countryside, being so close to the ground.

The other peculiar thing about this plant I love, is the layers of beauty it reveals during its growth. After the bright yellow dandelion-like flower has done it’s work (by attracting pollinators) it folds and appears to die. The head droops as if the effort of flower production and increasing length of the stem has been too much for the plant. The next bit of magic occurs when the drooping flower head becomes erect again and ‘shows off’ the fluffy white seed ‘clock’. (Effectively sticking it’s head up high to allow the wind to disperse the seed.) And all this activity without a single leaf on show!

Work in progress © Eleanor Christopher

It is amazing how long a painting can take to produce. As an exercise I timed how long I spent actually ‘applying paint to the page’, but this is only half the story. I spend an extraordinary amount of time just looking. Looking at every tiny detail, every surface; is it smooth, shiny, hairy, rigid or flaccid? The very ‘temperament’ of the plant – is it strong and confident or weak and timid? I practice mindfulness and there could be no better example of being ‘mindful’ than when it comes to the JUST LOOKING phase.

The difficult parts of a painting require no distractions or interruptions; 100% concentration is necessary and Radio 4 has to be turned off! As the painting progresses, I begin to relax with it and the part I enjoy most is the ‘finishing’ – checking the edges with a 000 brush and magnifying glass.

I hope I have managed to capture some of the action and drama of this plant in the painting. I try to be less critical of my work these days. It is a fabulous way to improve future paintings when one asks ‘what went wrong?’ or ‘what could have been done better?’, but I also try to step back from the inner critic and note the resulting joy that a painting confers to both me and the viewer.

When I finish a painting, I have always learnt something new. Something about the beautiful intricate complex world of a particular plant, that is either new to me, or that unknowingly coexisted with me all my life, but one that I had never truly seen before. Botanical art is after all, an important means to help us really see and appreciate the intricate beauty, and astounding diversity, of plant life.

Eleanor in her studio

See more of Eleanor’s work at: http://rosslynchapelart.com

Oyster plant

Mertensia maritima – Kathy Pickles

Mertensia maritima – growing on the beach in South Ronaldsay © Kathy Pickles

This is only the second time I have painted Mertensia. The first time was in 1993, when I was asked if I would like to provide an illustration for a future number of Curtis’s Botanical Magazine. (The illustration finally appeared in the magazine in 2009, as part of a special publication celebrating the 250th anniversary of the founding of Kew Gardens.) The accompanying article, by Steve Alton and Rosemary Fitzgerald, described the study of Mertensia seed and “its history and prospects as a subarctic plant at the southern limits of its range in northern Britain”. Included in the article was a line drawing by Stella Ross-Craig and a photograph of the plant in situ by Martyn Rix, the magazine’s current editor.

I was very keen to paint Mertensia again as it seemed an appropriate subject for the Flora Scotia exhibition. Its distribution around the coastline of the British Isles has declined greatly and Orkney is one of its remaining strongholds.

Tracking down the plant might have been a problem but, luckily, a fellow allotment holder and naturalist, Tim Dean, was able to point me in the direction of a particular beach in South Ronaldsay (the southernmost of the islands joined to the Orkney Mainland by the Churchill Barriers). This was great news for me, a non-driver, as I could get there by bus and a half-hour walk.

Finding the plant proved remarkably easy and there were enough vigorous specimens that taking a couple of stems wasn’t going to have any impact. I wondered at first if I would be able to locate it as the area just below the dunes was covered in frosted orache. However, I needn’t have worried as its wide spreading stems, blue green leaves and intense blue flowers made it instantly recognisable from some distance. It is a very beautiful plant and was just coming into flower so I was able to see it at its very best.

Mertensia maritima in the studio © Kathy Pickles

Back in the studio I had to find a way of laying out the specimen so as to mimic its prostrate habit. I solved the problem by using an orchid-holder tube hanging off the edge of a board, which I kept topped up with water at least twice a day. I was then able to spread the plant out and leave it untouched.

The specimen lasted very well and a second trip to collect another stem a couple of weeks later was all I needed.

One thing I discovered was that Mertensia is known as oyster plant as its leaves are edible. They are reputed to taste a bit like oysters and are considered a delicacy in some places. I did try one of the leaves but it wasn’t an experience I would want to repeat in a hurry!

photo: © Kathy Pickles

Scottish primrose

Primula scotica, grown from seed by Sharon Bradley.

Photo: © Sharon Bradley

Common dog violet

Viola riviniana – Hazel Morris

Visiting a friend near Gatehouse, we were out walking her dogs up a rough track in the Galloway hills on a glorious day just before Easter, when I spied a tiny flash of purple nestling between two clumps of wild primroses.  Stepping carefully into the muddy ditch and bending over as far as I dared, I marvelled at the beauty of a single tiny dog violet, its petals perfectly formed and opened towards the sun.

photo: © David Morris

Rounding a bend a little further on, we came upon dozens of them dotted all over a large section of the bank, protected on one side by the deep muddy ditch and on the other by a thick layer of overhanging brambles.  It was at that point that inspiration hit me, and I realised that this might make a suitable subject for suitable subject for my entry for the Flora Scotia exhibition.  But could I get enough information to make it possible for me to record and paint this tiny delicate subject?  Looking at the profuse array along that particular section of the track, I felt that as there were plenty specimens growing well, this would allow me to pot up two carefully, and take them home to observe, paint and identify.  This we did, and while I braved the ditch and brambles to pot them up with plenty of the soil they were growing in, my husband set up his camera and photographed the best examples which I pointed out to him.

photo: © David Morris

The potted specimens are continuing to thrive on my windowsill at home, and I have managed to paint several more heads from bud through to fully open.  In the summer, when I have recorded and painted all the information I can about the plant, and perhaps even collected some seed, I hope to return them to the same bank where I found them.

The spear thistle

Cirsium vulgare – Janet Watson

Cirsium vulgare, ©Janet Watson

I took up botanical painting in my retirement after teaching. I was one of the first students to take the RBGE Diploma in Botanical Illustration. About a year after the first graduation at RBGE, Chris Beardshaw, who presented us with our diplomas, asked each of us to illustrate one month of his monthly articles in the English Garden magazine. I was asked to illustrate a spear thistle and earwigs (2 separate illustrations) for the Sept. 2012 magazine.

I searched round the countryside between Doune and Dunblane where I live and found that the farmers cut them down. Eventually Alexa Scott Plummer (another Diploma guinea pig) gave me a huge spear thistle growing on her land in the Borders. It was a huge plant which more than filled the refuse sack in which I had to get it home. I potted it up in a very large pot. I made a drawing quite quickly but I spent nearly a month trying to paint it in watercolour. I just couldn’t get the fuzzy effect of the numerous hairs on the leaves. Eventually I tried coloured pencils and completed the illustration in less than one week!

I’m a keen gardener and I grow most of the plants I paint in my garden. In recent years I’ve painted commissions of fungi, Primula auriculas of various kinds, hellebores, snowdrops and the Madame Gregoire Staechelin rose. I’m also proud to have painted Thymus vulgaris for RBGE where it is housed in the Botanics Cottage. Most of my work is done on commission.