Seize your inspiration! Sign up for Summer Intensives to make the most of the season.

For Abbey Liebman, a fashion design artist in New York City, enrolling in the Botanical Art Summer Intensives was a rewarding way to broaden her skills in fashion design and the arts that was “well worth the money.”

“After taking just a few of the NYBG classes, I have already done freelance design work in botanical art for an apothecary company’s labels. I’d like to do more work like that or begin selling my own art,” says Abbey. She plans to get a certificate at NYBG over the period of a few years while she continues to work at her regular job.

Apothecary label illustration, by Abbey Liebman

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Suppose you really can’t draw, but always wished you could…especially when it comes to drawing those gorgeous blooms in your backyard. Well now’s your chance to make your wish come true: Botanical Drawing I is just one of the new summer intensive classes offered by NYBG starting in July. Think of it as a summer camp experience designed for grown-ups.

With the botanical drawing class, in just one week you’ll learn specific techniques for drawing accurately, including professional standards of form, measuring, foreshortening, and perspective. The classes are offered in July (9 through 13) or August (6 through 10), at NYBG and the Midtown Manhattan Center, respectively.
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Kathie Miranda is the coordinator of the Botanical Art and Illustration program here at The New York Botanical Garden. She is a natural science illustration educator and artist, teaching and exhibiting nationwide.

Prayer Plant, © Kathie Miranda

During the recent American Society of Botanical Artists (ASBA) Conference, our very own Kathie Miranda was honored as the first-ever recipient of the ASBA Anne Marie Carney Award. The honor was given in recognition of outstanding work in an exhibition for Kathie’s colored pencil on Mylar painting, entitled Prayer Plant.

The family of talented artist and ASBA member Anne Marie Carney has created an endowment fund to award one upcoming botanical artist annually, a proposed tradition which has garnered enough donation funding to support it for the next 36 years. For the inaugural ceremony in Boston on October 29, a team of three jurors selected the artwork for the award.
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Medals for excellence were awarded to selected artists for their work in Green Currency: Plants in the Economy at the festive opening reception on Wednesday, April 20. This is the first medal-awarding international juried exhibition of contemporary botanical art in the United States, and is presented by the Botanical Garden and the American Society of Botanical Artists. The exhibition, which features 43 plants used in medicine, food, clothing, and shelter, will be on view in the Arthur and Janet Ross Gallery through July 31.

Dr. Shirley Sherwood, renowned contemporary botanical art collector and chair of the jury, along with Gregory Long, President of The New York Botanical Garden, presented the awards. Honorable Mentions for excellence in specific categories were also selected and announced. Click on an image below to see the commended works of art.

[Show picture list]

Gold: Beverly Allen, Coconut palm, Cocos nucifera, watercolor on paper

Silver: Asuka Hishiki, Garlic, Allium sativum, watercolor on paper

Bronze: Ingrid Finnan, Common ginger, Zingiber officinale, oil on paper

Honorable Mention, Prints: Monika deVries Gohlke, Jade-stripe bamboo, Bambusa vulgaris ‘Vittata’, hand-colored aquatint on paper

Honorable Mention, Drawing: Carrie Megan, Morels, Morchella sp., graphite on paper

Honorable Mention, Artistic Merit: Rosemary Bauman, Princess tree, Paulownia tomentosa, watercolor on paper

Honorable Mention, Work on Vellum: Karen Kluglein, Grapes, Vitis vinifera, watercolor on vellum

The New York Botanical Garden Acquisition Prize: Karen Kluglein, Grapes, Vitis vinifera, watercolor on vellum

A full-color exhibition catalog featuring all of the works in the show is available for purchase at Shop in the Garden. An audio tour in the Gallery includes personal statements from each of the artists; signage throughout the Garden grounds identify the living plants portrayed in many of the featured works of art.

The Garden’s Adult Education Program offers classes in Botanical Art for all levels. Browse courses,  or order a free catalog to learn more.

Sutton Exhibition at Garden and two Other Shows Launch Concept

Robin A. Jess is Executive Director of the American Society of Botanical Artists, which has its national office at The New York Botanical Garden. She has had a long relationship with the Garden as a freelance botanical illustrator and as the first coordinator of the Botanical Art Certificate program.

It occurred to me earlier this summer that the opening of three major exhibitions of contemporary botanical art in New York City during the same week (September 13–17) would be cause for celebration. I thought that by combining the star power of the three and declaring “Botanical Art Week in NYC,” we could draw more attention to these exciting exhibitions. The hosts of the three exhibitions—Jeff Downing, Vice President for Education at the Botanical Garden, Chris Murtha at the Horticultural Society of New York (HSNY), and Francesca Anderson of Brooklyn Botanic Garden (BBG)—all agreed that it was a great idea. And so, Botanical Art Week was born.

This fall in New York offers an in-depth immersion in beautiful art that accurately portrays the world of flora. You’ll find works in these shows by noted contemporary botanical artists such as Jean Emmons, Derek Norman, Lizzie Sanders, and Jessica Tcherepnine. You’ll also find the work of talented artists who trained or who teach in NYBG’s Botanical Art and Illustration Certificate Program. Get inspired by viewing the work and then take a course at the Garden to begin your own creative journey.

An opening reception for the exhibition Botanicals: Environmental Expressions in Art, The Alisa and Isaac M. Sutton Collection will be held on Thursday, September 16, from 5 to 8 p.m. in the Arthur and Janet Ross Gallery at the Botanical Garden (RSVP to 718.817.8598). Since his first acquisition in 1998, Brooklyn’s Isaac Sutton has continued to acquire or commission works, amassing the largest privately owned collection of contemporary botanical art in North America. Working with Curators Susan Frei Nathan and Alice Marcus Kreig, Sutton selected the pieces shown for their ability to raise awareness of our environment. read more »

Traveling Exhibition Opens Next Week at the Garden

Carol Woodin is Exhibitions Coordinator for the American Society of Botanical Artists and a freelance botanical artist.

An organization of artists and illustrators who depict plants, the American Society of Botanical Artists (ASBA) began a project in 2006 to tell two stories: the continuing relevance of botanical art and the often neglected story of plant endangerment, as the decline of the world’s plant life is one of the most significant issues of our time. The result is the traveling exhibition Losing Paradise? Endangered Plants Here and Around the World, which opens at The New York Botanical Garden Thursday, May 6.

Artists from around the country and the world worked to capture the threatened and endangered plant life in their neighborhood or farther afield over the course of about three years (such as the image above
© Jean Emmons, Ixia viridiflora, Green Ixia, watercolor on vellum). This project has encouraged ASBA members to learn about today’s endangered plants, to depict more of them, to grow relationships with people involved in studying and conserving them, and to develop ethical field study techniques. Endangered plants are by definition difficult to find, and in some cases, excellent orienteering skills are needed. Once found, they sometimes require multiple years of study for a completely accurate depiction. Collaboration with scientists, conservationists, and botanical gardens bridges the disciplines of art and science and enriches both. read more »