ArtPlantae Today

Integrating Art, Science and Writing

December 13, 2013 by Tania Marien

Making images as natural as speaking.

– Heinemann Publishing

This is the focus of New Entries: Learning by Writing and Drawing by Ruth Hubbard and Karen Ernst, a collection of case studies about teachers integrating art, science and writing in their classrooms. Thirteen educators contributed to this book and generously share classroom activities and their own learning processes with readers. Here is what you’ll find inside this enlightening resource:

Drawing Rachel In

Widening the Frame: Reading, Writing and Art in Learning

Writing Pictures, Painting Words: Artists Notebooks in Literacy Workshops

Opening Up to Art: Imagery and Story in a High School Reading Class

Beyond Answers

Putting Art on the Scientist’s Palette
Mary Stein (scientist) and Brenda Power (writer)
Stein and Power offer practical suggestions about how teachers can integrate art, science and language to move beyond the perceived boundaries between disciplines.

Imagination Through Images: Visual Responses to Literature
Ruth Shagoury Hubbard
Hubbard discusses how students can use drawing and writing to help them understand what they read.

Reading the Image and Viewing the Words: Languages Intertwined
Irene C. Fountas (Professor, Education)
Janet L. Olson (Professor, Art Education)
Fountas and Olson discuss how reading informs drawing and how viewing images informs writing.

Parallel Journeys: Exploring Through Art and Writing in Fourth Grade
Peter von Euler, teacher
Peter von Euler explains how the use of “observational journals” helped his students unite writing and art.

I Look at My Pictures and Then Try It: Art as a Tool for Learning
Jean Anne Clyde (Professor, Literacy)
Clyde shares a story about a student’s use of art as a learning tool and how this student searched for meaning in texts, learned from others and integrated drama, art and math.

Reclaiming the Power of Visual Thinking with Adult Learners
Ruth Shagoury Hubbard
Through her work, Hubbard aims to make “visual language” commonplace among adults. In this chapter, she offers suggestions about how to introduce adults to visual learning.

Background, Foreground: From Experience to Classroom Practice
Karen Ernst
Ernst writes about a summer art workshop for teachers and how this workshop made teachers more sensitive to how their students learn.

Drawing My Selves Together: An Editor’s Notebook
Toby Gordon, education publisher
Editor Toby Gordon describes how editing the book Picturing Learning by Karen Ernst helped move her past negative comments about her work made by her kindergarten teacher.

New Entries: Learning by Writing and Drawing is no longer in print. Search for a used copy at your favorite independent used bookstore.

Literature Cited
Hubbard, Ruth Shagoury and Karen Ernst. 1996. New Entries: Learning by Writing and Drawing. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann

Visualizing Science

December 6, 2013 by Tania Marien

This month we’re looking at how our hands are involved in how we create, teach and communicate. Today we continue to explore this topic by considering what scientists draw and create with their hands.

In Envisioning Explanations – The Art in Science, professor David C. Gooding discusses how scientists tell visual stories. He distinguishes between static visualizations (i.e., printed images), multimedia images and the types of images visual artists and scientists create in their respective disciplines.

Regarding the latter, Gooding (2004) compares images in the visual arts to images in the sciences. He describes images in the visual arts as being “self-sufficient…carriers of meaning” (Gooding, 2004) and describes images in the sciences as having more than one purpose. He explains that scientific images have many functions. They first serve to convey “a tentative understanding” of an event and then serve as an aid to communicate this event to others (Gooding, 2004).

In his article, which is part of a collection of articles about science illustration, Gooding provides examples of how scientists have translated observations and large amounts of information into hand-drawn images and hand-built models — forms of visualization, he explains, science demands because “science is mostly about processes we cannot experience” (Gooding, 2004).

The examples of visualization he refers to include:

Michael Faraday’s sketch describing the relationship between electricity, magnetism and motion.
Re-animating extinct organisms by reconstructing fossils using drawings and the transformed mental imagery of the scientist and artist.
Constructing visualizations of vascular structures.
Stacking images to create 3-D models.
Plotting patterns to build molecules.
Using diagrams to explain an invisible process.

Through these examples and others, Gooding (2004) brings attention to the art (i.e., patterns, dots, sketches, datasets, etc.) in science while showing how scientists, as science communicators, try to deliver “intellectual understanding” (Gooding, 2004) of an experience through visualization.

While Gooding’s focus is science illustration in general, what he writes about applies also to the study of plants.

If you are interested specifically in how botanists and artists have historically described plants and presented plants to a general audience, consider books about the history of botanical art, such as Martyn Rix’s The Golden Age of Botanical Art and Karin Nickelsen’s superb book about the creation of 18th-century botanical illustrations.

Dr. Gooding’s Envisioning Explanations was published in a special issue of the journal of Interdisciplinary Science Reviews dedicated to the topic of science illustration.

Also included in this issue of Interdisciplinary Science Reviews is
When the Botanist Can’t Draw, an article about how Linnaeus described plants.

Literature Cited
Gooding, David C. 2004. Envisioning explanations – the art in science. Interdisciplinary Science Reviews. 29(3): 278-294. https://doi.org/10.1179/030801804225018792

(Link updated June 2024)

Also See
Imagery in Scientific Communication

Posted in botanical art, Teaching & Learning, teaching and learning | 2 Comments »

Gift Cards for Botanical Art Classes

December 4, 2013 by Tania Marien

Mark Granlund opens Jack-in-the-Pulpit Studio and offers a holiday special with every gift card purchased.

Buy a gift card good for classes at Jack-in-the-Pulpit Studio before
January 2, 2014 and receive a 10% bonus. Gift cards purchased during the holiday season are worth their face value plus 10%. So if you purchase a $50 gift card, it will be good for $55 worth of classes at Mark’s new studio.

Here is the latest news at Classes Near You > Minnesota:

Jack-in-the-Pulpit Studio
www.jackinthepulpitstudio.com
This is the private studio of Mark Granlund. Classes in botanical and fine art are taught by Mark and guest instructors. Mark also teaches an online class. Find out how Mark developed his online botanical art class in this 2010 interview.

Drawing: The Basic Elements

Drawing: The Basic Elements – for the Very Busy (online)
January 10 – February 14, 2014
This is the online edition of Drawing: The Basic Elements. Participants will attend two studio sessions for critique and to share work. These sessions will occur on January 31, 2014 and February 14, 2014. Cost: $95

Introduction to Botanical Watercolor
Tuesdays, January 7 – February 11, 2014
6:30 – 9:00 PM
Learn the basics of creating botanical images in watercolor. Students will learn how to approach a plant to illustrate, how to apply paint to paper to create a simple but precise image, and how to plot out color relationships for a successful painting. The instructor will also cover the basics of brushes, papers and paints. Cost: $165

Trees in Ink: Pen and Brush
Friday, February 28, 2014 (6:30 – 9:00 PM)
Saturday, March 1, 2014 (12-3 PM)
Learn how to capture the beauty and structure of winter trees in ink. Cost: $60

View additional information for each class, get material lists and register for all classes online at Jack-in-the-Pulpit Studio.

Posted in botanical art, Education, Learning Opportunities, Special Announcements, Special Events |

Get Ready for the Release of ‘American Botanical Paintings’

December 3, 2013 by Tania Marien

Pre-order today. Free shipping through December 31, 2013.

American Botanical Paintings: Native Plants of the Mid Atlantic
Botanical Artists for Education
& the Environment
February 2014

Members and supporters of
Botanical Artists for Education and & the Environment (BAEE) eagerly await the publication of American Botanical Paintings: Native Plants of the Mid Atlantic. Featuring 60 reproductions of original paintings and drawings of plants and 40 original paintings of butterflies, moths, and other pollinators, this book represents more than three years of work by BAEE members. Illustrations complement information about each plant and their respective habitats, as well as how the plants were used by Native Americans or early settlers.

Botanist and collector, Dr. Shirley Sherwood OBE, says American Botanical Paintings is “a delightfully illustrated book, beautifully designed and with lots of variety in the choice of plant subjects. I admired the standard of painting and the fresh, appealing studies, which will be attractive to both naturalists and gardeners.”

Botanical Artists for Education & the Environment (BAEE) created
American Botanical Paintings: Native Plants of the Mid Atlantic for lovers of art and plants. Bonnie Driggers, BAEE President, says the group hopes to “foster a particular appreciation not only for the beauty of native plants and their artistic representations but also for their importance to the environment and to encourage, where practical, the use of native plants in home gardens.”

American Botanical Paintings: Native Plants of the Mid Atlantic is now available to order from Starbooks ($39.95). Pre-orders placed before
December 31, 2013 will be shipped for free when the book is released in
February 2014. The book is expected to ship by February 1, 2014. An exhibition of the paintings will open on February 15, 2014, at the U.S. Botanic Garden in Washington, DC.

BAEE will give proceeds from the sale of the book to nonprofit organizations supporting native plant education, conservation, and horticulture.

Order American Botanical Paintings at Starbooks

Posted in botanical art, botanical art books, Education, Learning Opportunities, Special Announcements, Special Events |

Create Tropical Botanical Art in the West Indies

December 2, 2013 by Tania Marien

Lisa Coddington invites you to join her on an adventure to draw and paint tropical plants on Grenada, one of the Spice Islands of the Caribbean.

See what’s new in the Classes Near You sections for New Mexico and the
West Indies!

Lisa Coddington
www.lisacoddington.com
Lisa Coddington is an artist, instructor and the owner of True Gesso Panels, archival gesso panels for painting and silver point. Lisa invites you to join her on an adventure drawing and painting tropical plants on Grenada, one of the Spice Islands of the Caribbean.

Tropical Botanical Art Workshop, Grenada, West Indies

Now is the perfect time to reserve your space for a special five-day class in Grenada, West Indies Island. Draw and paint where tropical plants flourish and where they consistently win awards at the Chelsea Flower Show in England. Whether you are a beginner or an experienced artist you are invited to learn step-by-step drawing and watercolor techniques at this unique location. This botanical art session supports participants’ individual artistic goals with personal attention and demonstrations. The Grenada Horticulture Society will share their award-winning Chelsea Flower Show experience. Free time is scheduled to enjoy island tours and relax on island beaches.
An extra day includes other tours of the island.

Cost: $550 USD, excludes airfare, hotel and meals.

For more information and to register, contact Lisa Coddington via email or call 315-256-8639.

Registration Deadline: January 20, 2014

Posted in botanical art, Education, Learning Opportunities, Special Announcements, Special Events, travel |

Made by Hand

December 1, 2013 by Tania Marien

Made by Hand is the topic for December.

What do we create with our hands? What do they do for us?

We’ll begin this month by taking a look at the illustrations and documents created by centuries of botanists and artists. Plus we’ll revisit an ongoing project that is transforming a historic text into an illuminated manuscript.

And before I go…
Last month I announced that the publishing schedule for November and December would be light. I wanted to include this reminder, in case you’re wondering where I went. Hope you’ve enjoyed the Thanksgiving weekend.

Posted in Blog News, botanical art |

Botanical Art’s Golden Age

December 1, 2013 by Tania Marien

TheGoldenAgeOfBotanicalArt Drawing
Painting
Engraving
Coloring
Observing
Stippling

These are some of the techniques botanists and artists use to document plants. Each executed with a keen eye for observation and a steady hand. What we know about plants today would not be possible if it weren’t for the botanists, explorers, doctors, artists and observers who came before us. Many centuries before us.

A new book about the contributions made by these passionate educators was finally released in the United States. The stories of these brave, creative and hard-working souls are shared in The Golden Age of Botanical Art, a wonderful history book by Martyn Rix that is sure to be enjoyed by anyone with an interest in natural history art.

This book is filled with fascinating history and stories about famous and not-so-famous people, many of whom I learned about for the first time. Rix cross-references people, places and events throughout his book and while this helps readers form a big picture of history, it makes summarizing a challenge.
Allow me to give you a quick tour of each section.

The Origins of Botanical Art

Learn why botanical illustrations were created. Also learn about ancient herbals, flower painting during the Renaissance, Leonardo di Vinci, Albrecht Durer, woodcuts, the Turkish Empire, English herbals and why the paintings of Jacopo Ligozzi (1547-1626) were better than anyone who came before him.

Seventeenth-Century Florilegia
Learn about the plants brought to Europe by travelers and naturalists and how the work of botanical illustrators contributed to the development of botany.

North American Plants
Learn about the introduction of North American plants into English gardens and learn about the work of artists and botanists such as John Tradescant the Younger, Mark Catesby, John and William Bartram, Andre & Francois Michaux, Georg Dionysius Ehret and Carl Linnaeus.

Travelers to the Levant
European interest in Asia and the Ottoman Empire is the focus of this section. Botanists and painters receiving special attention are Joseph Pitton de Tournefort, Claude Aubriet, John Sibthorp, and Maria Sibylla Merian.

The Exploration of Russia & Japan
Learn about botanical expeditions into Russia and Japan. View images from Flora Rossica, Flora Japonica and learn about a collection of paintings on vellum started by botanist and naturalist, Gaston d’Orleans.

Botany Bay & Beyond
Learn about expeditions into Australia, the work of artists Sydney Parkinson and Ferdinand Bauer and the scientific contributions of Sir Joseph Banks.

The Golden Age in England
Learn how the Royal Gardens at Kew began and view beautiful plant studies such as the study of Pinus larix by Ferdinand Bauer and the graceful Galeandra devoniana, an orchid by Miss Sarah Anne Drake who was John Lindley’s chief artist.

South American Adventures
Expeditions into Spain and the amazing collections of work produced from these expeditions are the focus of this section.

The Golden Age in France
Learn about Gerard van Spaendonck (Pierre-Joseph Redouté’s teacher), Redouté and Empress Josephine in this section.

Botanical and Horticultural Illustrated Journals
Learn about the history surrounding illustrated journals such as Curtis’s Botanical Magazine, The Botanical Register and others.

Early Chinese Plant Drawings
Learn about the type of botanical art created in China before the Europeans arrived.

The Company School in India
Learn about the work of Indian artists, English artists and the publications produced during the time when the East India Company controlled trade in the East Indies.

A New Era at Kew
More history about Kew and how this world-famous garden was established.

Victorian Travelers
An introduction to the botanical contributions made by artists Janet Hutton, Lt. General John Eyre, Charlotte Lugard, Charlotte Williams, Marianne North and Henry John Elwes.

Bringing China to Europe
This section is about the introduction of Chinese plants into European gardens.

The Flowers of War and Beyond
Rix discusses the history of botanical illustration during World War II. Learn what botanist Geoffrey Herklots did while in a Japanese prisoner-of-war camp and what Marianne North’s great nephew did after retiring as an Admiral from the Navy in 1960. Artists Margaret Mee, Barbara Everhard, Graham Stuart Thomas, Rory McEwen and Raymond Booth are also mentioned.

Rix closes his book discussing the work of contemporary botanical artists and by bringing attention to those making key contributions to the current renaissance of botanical art, namely instructor Anne Marie Evans and, of course, botanist and art collector Shirley Sherwood.

In the introduction to his book, Rix thinks aloud and wonders if what we are observing now in the world of botanical art is a new golden age. He explains that the period between 1750-1850 was considered a golden age because the demand for scientific information collided with the enthusiasm of wealthy patrons and with the availability of skilled artists capable of documenting new discoveries.

Today he wonders if the need to preserve disappearing habitat, combined with an abundance of botanical artists and the technological means to create botanical works faster and at a lower cost will create a new golden age even though there is a growing shortage of botanists.

What do you think?