Botanical Art Worldwide ...

Santalum acuminatum - Quandong © Vicki Lee Johnston

Australian artists were invited to submit for the Australian exhibition of the Botanical Art Worldwide initiative, to be held in Canberra in May.  

This exhibition is featured in a Worldwide Day of Botanical Art on May 18.

Botanical Art Worldwide website

Our Botanical Art Society of Australia  sent out expressions of interest a long time ago and I had made a choice for the native plant I wanted to paint as my submission.  I thought I had plenty of time and did my research, notes, planning etc ... only to find that when the plant came into flower we had a lot of very late storms and inclement weather - my only available flowering subjects had been battered by the high winds and heavy rain.  I realised because of my insistence on painting this subject that I was now left with very little available - the deadline was looming and I had to choose another subject quickly.   Back to the drawing board ..... literally!

My lovely Quandong bush has fruited for the first time!

It was during a gardening session on our property that I discovered our Quandong had begun fruiting for the first time since planting!  We planted this tree five years previously after another artwork assignment for the SBA - a part of my diploma portfolio.  Here is the first quandong artwork and the backstory. I had bought the small plant to study the leaf structure and growth habit.  Once I had finished we planted the shrub with its host plant (it is hemiparasitic) .    Being a desert quandong, it was left alone to do its thing and I checked on it frequently but until this time, five years on, it had not fruited.  I couldn't believe my luck.

Some of the bounty!

I was so happy to see the fruit, it can be quite tart and fleshy with a large brain-like nut inside, however I really love the quandong (or native peach) taste as I am quite partial to tart rather than sweet fruit.   I have to admit I ate the majority of the fruit, we had around forty and they were delicious!  Full of goodness and not to everyone's taste which is fine by me!

 Quandong can be eaten alone, added to sweet or savoury foods and contain vitamin C, the nuts containing complex oils and are a valued ingredient used by our indigenous people.  They are now becoming more widely used in high end restaurants and catering.

Because of my easy access to the plant, I was fortunately able to stage

my subject right in front of me to quickly study and draw.

On to my painting ... after the initial excitement of having my very own indigenous plant subject right in my back yard, I set to work very quickly drawing and composing the artwork.  I only had a week from start to finish, with no room for error.  Despite the rush I enjoyed working with this subject.

I was also lucky to have my sketchbook from the SBA course and found my old study pages for reference.  This really helps with colour selection and shortcuts a lot of the time spent colour testing.

First washes on the leaves ....

Bringing in the fruits ... starting with yellows, greens, oranges and reds

Gradually building up the layers of colour with the yellows, greens, oranges, reds and mapping out the stems and branches.

Getting a bit messy!

I like to look at my almost completed works from different angles, to check the liveliness, tones and form of the artwork so that it looks like a real subject viewed from all sides. 

Once I was happy I scanned the original artwork myself and also managed to get a professional        scan done.  As this artwork was to be submitted online to the jury via digital entry, the professional scan was the better option.  This took a few days and once ready it was sent off to be judged. 

 The judging took a couple of months and I was very happy to be notified that my artwork Santalum acuminatum - Quandong had been selected to be shown in the Flora of Australia exhibition.  It will be held in Canberra at the Ainslie Arts Centre from May 18 until May 27.  I will post another blog update as a reminder closer to the opening.

BASA information

Once I had been informed that my painting was chosen, I had some months to get it fine tuned and framed.  I always struggle with framing choices but usually go for something neutral.

So many choices!

This time I decided to coordinate with the native plant aspect by choosing a wooden frame which blended in with the colours used in the stems and branches.  Once the framing was completed I had now run out of time and it was straight to Pack and Send to head off to Canberra!

Childhood memories x

This painting has truly been a labour of love!  So many memories attached to my subject choice and the artistic experience reminded me of the plant itself, the difficulty struggling to germinate and flourish and the time taken to come to fruition.  Worth the wait for sure ...

On its way to Canberra

All images © Vicki Lee Johnston

Mixed feelings ...

 

I will admit to missing the continuity of assignment deadlines when we were in the SBA botanical art distance course.   It's been three months since the last artwork was completed and sent away to London for final marks - and both the artworks and I have done a lot of travelling since. The space and time have been very fruitful though and there are a lot more artwork deadlines up ahead - so instead of being daunted by them I will be grateful to have the motivation and appreciate working towards a goal.

The final of the three diploma works to show here is the Mixed Study - a variety of subjects loosely combined to show flowers, stems, leaves gathered together in different perspectives and angles.    I chose plants from my garden - those that were blooming prolifically as I needed to source them easily.  No time for heading out to the garden centre or florist as the final deadline was looming.  I chose a rose, bronze cottonwood, hibiscus and frangipani - it speaks volumes about the kind of summer garden we have and the plants that survive our intense heat. 

                                                 The first stages of the flower heads positioned.
            I had drawn all the elements onto tracing paper and moved them around to find a suitable
         composition so that the colours worked well together and the placement filled the page nicely.

 

Much time was spent doing colour studies to match the individual hues ...

I used oasis foam supported in a pot and played with the flower cuttings to see how they would appear together.  Here is an unfurling cottonwood bud which I cut and then next to it you can see where I placed my work in progress artwork behind it to see how it would fit in the composition.

 And here is the 'real' flower below drawn and painted into the composition ...

 I became glued to this art table for many days and nights -

my desk started to become quite overwhelmed with paint charts, palettes of colour, water containers etc!  Not to mention the plants, flowers, cuttings, and chaos all over the house ...

 

 I always try and turn an image of my artwork into a black and white version to check the contrast and tones in a piece ... I was very happy with this one and actually preferred it to the colour piece...

It's good to step away from the artwork during a break and look at it on a computer screen to zoom in and check for any overlooked elements ...

I also like to walk around the artwork to see if it looks 'real' from all angles - the three dimensionality is what brings a painting to life and if it looks like you could pick it off the page then I'm happy.

 Only a little more to go and the artwork was complete.

 

And voila - joined the other diploma artworks on the long journey from Western Australia to London.
Thanks for joining me on this wonderful journey in botanical art!
I love hearing from you too - your comments are much appreciated x

                                                             All images © Vicki Lee Johnston

Botanical illustration finale ...

I have been a bit slow updating my blog because life truly has gotten in the way - and then some!  So much has happened I can't begin to tell you ... so instead I guess I had better play catch up with the past few months and post the remaining diploma artworks to round off the completed SBA Distance course.  This one being the botanical illustration - which I touched on in an earlier post during the height of the madness.

Rough leaf rubbings in graphite on copy paper to study venation ...

plus a lot of close work to observe the reproductive elements

It took forever to work out the composition for this artwork - so many components came into play ...

The best way for me to compose is to have final drawings of each element on various cuttings of tracing paper and then move the pieces around until they fall into place in a pleasing arrangement.

Love the flowers of the Bauhinia variegata, starting to come to life ...

I quite liked the design with these two flowering stems ... but so much more to go!!

Really enjoyed the palette ... all my favourite colours came into play ...

There was so much detail to include on this illustration - I wanted the page to be very informative - showing the flower front, side and back view - bud, calyx, unfurling bud, leaves from all angles - ripe  and dehisced seed pod - and of course the dissections which were rendered in graphite.

 Watercolour work completed ...

 This was the most difficult and time consuming piece of all three diploma works due to the research and accurate observation and detail required.  I chose the Bauhinia variegata as it was flowering profusely at the time and I had already completed colour studies to include in my mixed floral composition - once again I worked on a few artworks simultaneously to ensure I was able to complete the course on time!
I was rewarded for my hard work when I saw this artwork hung in London at the annual Society of Botanical Artists (UK) Exhibition.

 Bauhinia variegata var. 'Variegata' - Butterfly Tree

Botanical Illustration with graphite dissections

© Vicki Lee Johnston