Learning Botanical illustration

Today I had the pleasure of participating in a botanical illustration workshop with the Botanical Artists’ Society of Queensland, at my local Redcliffe Museum. As an art teacher, it’s so wonderful to sit in the student’s seat and learn from professional artists using different techniques.

Facilitated by Dr Nita Lester, we looked at how to choose, photograph, arrange, dissect and colour match plant and flower specimens, before drawing them. I felt like a scientist-artist hybrid, using a magnifying glass, desk lights and plants alongside paper, pencil and watercolours. We were guided to draw large and miniature sections of plants in detail after looking very closely at the joints and flowers, to afford a greater understanding of each plant’s make-up.

My favourite plant was the Grevillea dorothy gordon, with its dusty pink and purple flower and leaves featuring veins with ‘gaps’ in them, rather than fleshing out to a usual full teardrop leaf shape. These veins and decorative leaves were just beautiful to draw.

I also spent quote some time looking at the flower head of the Grevillea, which is actually made up of many tiny individual flowers to create the floral cluster. So interesting to look so closely into one of Mother Nature’s marvels. There’s a botanical drawing exhibition on at the gallery also, which is itself surrounded by beautiful plants we could snip and use in our art-making. Overall, a very informative and inspiring day.