The Biodiversity Heritage Library Flickr photostream contains several digital image collections, including Flowering Plants, Algae, Ferns, Fungi & Mosses, and BHL Books.

Featured in the BHL Books collection is the atlas from Jean Gourdon and Philibert Naudin’s 1871 work Nouvelle iconographie fourragère: histoire botanique, économique et agricole des plantes fourragères et des plantes nuisibles qui se rencontrent dans les prairies et les paturages : avec planches gravées sur cuivre et coloriées / par J. Gourdon, P. Naudin. This item was digitized in 2009 by The New York Botanical Garden’s Mertz Library.

The atlas includes an illustration of a coquelicot, or corn poppy:

Also available on the photostream are detailed and thumbnail views of other illustrations in the book.

(Side note: also in the 1870s, in Argenteuil, France, Claude Monet painted his famous Coquelicots (Poppies), which today resides at the Musée d’Orsay in Paris.)

The Biodiversity Heritage Library is a consortium of twelve natural history and botanical libraries that cooperate to digitize and make accessible the legacy literature of biodiversity held in their collections and to make that literature available for open access and responsible use as a part of a global “biodiversity commons.”

The LuEsther T. Mertz Library is a BHL partner.

Heirloom Tomato, 'Solanum lycopersicum' © 2009 Asuka Hishiki, watercolor on paper

Green Currency: Plants in the Economy–an exhibition of botanical art at The New York Botanical Garden which opens to the public today–offers the rare chance to look through a wide array of beautifully hand-drawn or hand-painted illustrations of plants. Each plant has been chosen for its economic value and importance in our everyday lives.

Forty-three works were selected out of a field of 258 entries and are presented in the Arthur and Janet Ross Gallery in this first ever juried exhibition of international botanical art at the Garden. Common fruits, vegetables, herbs, trees, and flowers that serve not only as sources of sustenance, but are also where many modern medicines, furnishings, textiles, and biofuels come from are masterfully rendered with scientific precision using various media such as graphite, watercolor, colored pencil, oil, and acrylic. The exhibition is being presented in conjunction with the American Society of Botanical Artists.

Hops, 'Humulus lupulus' © 2009 Bobbi Angell, copperplate

In this era when, with the click of a button you can effortlessly capture an image for prosperity with your camera, or even with your phone—for better or for worse, the act of capturing this landscape of immediacy can be gratifying: What you see is what you get, right here; right now. The opportunity to see beyond the moment, though, is often missed in this instant–or worse yet ignored. To be able to truly see something and engage in the art of observation offers the chance to look into the beauty that is often found in the details. The works in Green Currency: Plants in the Economy are imbued with an inescapable tangibility: Fruit appears to be ripe for the picking; vegetables ready to be chopped, sliced, and sautéd. The works speak to the viewer through the glass in a way that invites–or rather compels–you to look closer.

Take the time to truly see each of these 43 selections, and allow yourself to get lost in the details as each of these artists already has. It will be time well spent.

Check out this short video to learn more about Green Currency: Plants in the Economy.

Wendy Hollender is Program Coordinator for Botanical Art and Illustration in The New York Botanical Garden’s Continuing Education program. She is also author of Botanical Drawing: A Beginner’s Guide, available at Shop in the Garden.

Twice a year The New York Botanical Garden hosts a free Open House where people can sample some of the Continuing Education course offerings in an informal but informative setting. The upcoming event on September 12 will also feature Career Information Sessions, at which you can hear how former students changed their lives and pursued their passions in new careers.

I have been attending these Open Houses for three years now as a program coordinator and instructor. Last spring, in addition to offering a demonstration by a botanical instructor, we offered for the first time a mini class in botanical illustration. I taught a lesson in colored pencil in which participants were given my favorite watercolor paper and pencils with which to try and render a simple fruit in color. This year we will again offer a similar mini class.

Some who had been hesitant about their ability to draw were in for a pleasant surprise when exposed to a very simple step-by-step procedure to drawing. Many of those who attended that mini class liked it so much that they signed up for full classes and are now enthusiastic students in the program.

For those who have never drawn, as well as for those who are professional artists in other fields, the Botanical Art and Illustration program at NYBG offers an opportunity to learn drawing and to study plants up close.

In these difficult economic times I have seen an increase in students from other professions with time on their hands. What a wonderful opportunity to study botanical illustration, leading to a new passion and the possibility of enhancing an existing profession.

I have also noticed an increase in botanical illustration in the world at large as evidenced by three recent magazine articles on the topic in Victoria (April 2009), Fine Art Connoisseur (July/August 2009), and The Artist’s Magazine (September), in which I am profiled.

And if botanical illustration isn’t your thing, you are sure to find other areas of interest at the Open House: Floral Design, Landscape Design, Gardening, and more.

Come to NYBG for a day of exploration of the Continuing Education program. I hope to see you there!