Premiering tonight, Wednesday, June 10, an incredible live presentation by internationally renowned artist Jenny Holzer will take place at the Garden—and we hope you’ll join us for the opportunity to experience it! For four consecutive nights during our Frida al Fresco evenings, Jenny Holzer in conjunction with The Poetry Society of America and The New York Botanical Garden will present a program of scrolling light projections on the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory.
For more than 30 years Jenny Holzer has presented her astringent ideas, arguments, and sorrows in public places and international exhibitions. Her medium is always writing, and the public dimension is integral to the delivery of the work. Reflecting Kahlo’s intense relationship with her culture and the natural world, Holzer’s hour-long presentation will include poems by Mexico’s Nobel Prize winner Octavio Paz, verses from contemporary Mexican female poets, and even a selection of powerful passages from Frida Kahlo’s own diary.
Juana and Yolanda, our visiting Mexican artisans, delighted the public with their artistic weaving and embroidery techniques.
During the opening weeks of FRIDA KAHLO: Art, Garden, Life, the Botanical Garden hosted two special guests from Mexico. Juana and Yolanda, sisters from the town of Zinacatán in the state of Chiapas, were showing off the ancient technique of weaving with the back strap loom and decorating cloth with beautiful embroidery. Wearing traditional garments that they made and adorned themselves, they caught the attention of many visitors.
To the delight of all visitors, two giant caterpillar topiaries—dubbed Frida and Diego—have recently been designed and planted by NYBG gardeners, Diana Babbitt and Katie Bronson, in the Everett Children’s Adventure Garden.
“We thought it would be fun to try to make a Frida caterpillar,” explains Katie. “So we looked at a lot of her pictures where she is wearing flower headdresses and we tried to make one of those.”
Frida is filled with deep purple-red coleus punctuated by bright pink Zinnia elegans that contrasts with nearly black Salviadiscolor on her body. Her raised head is softened by green ‘Round Leaf’ Hedera, and her eyes look straight ahead, portrait-style, under those famous bushy eyebrows.
Happy Friday! Once again it is time for our weekly roundup of weekend programs and activities at the Garden. June 6 & 7 is Rose Garden Weekend!
This popular highlight of the season’s Spring Weekend offerings at NYBG is when we invite you all to enjoy the seasonal beauty of the Peggy Rockefeller Rose Garden‘s nearly 700 rose cultivars! According to Rose Watch, they are now at 75% of peak color, and and rapidly climbing toward full bloom. Admire the vibrant blooming season with live music, refreshments, and expert-led tours and talks—a beautiful experience for everyone from casual rose admirers to experienced rosarians. You can even take part in a rose gardening demonstration.
Read on for full details about this weekend’s programming in the Rose Garden and beyond! Plus delicious cooking demonstrations and activities for kids.
NYBG is pleased to continue its partnership with Whole Foods Market for another season of fresh, nutritious, and delicious family food activities. Through September, hundreds of local families and school children will visit the Whole Foods Market Family Kitchen in the Ruth Rea Howell Family Garden for daily hands-on cooking and tasting events hosted by NYBG Staff. Whole Foods Market will also host seasonal demonstrations and tastings by the Reflective Pool on the last Wednesday of June, July, August, and September from 1 to 3 p.m., coinciding with NYBG’s fan-favorite Greenmarket.
The Ruth Rea Howell Family Garden—and its groundbreaking programming—is at the heart of the Edible Academy and the future site of a new, state-of-the-art building that will serve as the hub for edible education at NYBG. Together, the Edible Academy and the Family Garden bring plenty of fun for adults and kids alike, with cooking demonstrations in the Whole Foods Market Family Garden Kitchen and daily, hands-on gardening activities. Bring the family to the Garden this summer for wholesome and yummy learning experience!
Ecological restoration, or “the process of assisting in the recovery of an ecosystem that has been degraded, damaged, or destroyed” (SER, 2004), is what the Forest staff, interns, and volunteers do in the Thain Family Forest every day to reduce invasive plants and increase native plant regeneration in managed areas through planting.
We start with an inventory that samples nearly 250 plots that are 10 meters by 10 meters squared. The sampling involves measuring all trees and shrubs, living or dead, with one centimeter or greater diameter at breast height (DBH) and collecting percent cover information for all herbaceous plants, woody plant seedlings and saplings, and non-living components such as leaf litter, coarse woody debris, and bare soil. This inventory is repeated every five years and provides a picture of forest change overtime that allows us to prioritize management and guide the restoration process: inventory, establish priorities, manage invasive species, restore native species, and repeat. The Forest staff last carried out an inventory in 2011 and will be repeating this process in the summer of 2016.
Roses come in all shapes, sizes, and colors—some quite different from what you would expect! Follow their progress on Rose Watch as these beautiful flowers approach the peak of their seasonal color.
Left to right: Jensen Wheeler Wolfe, Bob Grese, Carey Lundin, and Darrel Morrison shared their insights on the legacy of Jens Jensen and his revolutionary urban landscape designs.
“We all need the living green or we’ll shrivel up inside. To make the modern city livable is the task of our times.”
– Jens Jensen
On Earth Day, Wednesday, April 22, The Humanities Institute hosted New York City’s only screening of the award-winning documentary, Jens Jensen The Living Green. Followed by a panel featuring the film’s director and scholars in ecological landscape design, the event attracted more than 200 people in an exploration of the work of Jens Jensen (1860–1951) and its relevance to today’s urban environmental issues. Jensen was a passionate environmental activist and now, 50 years after his death, he is hailed as a pioneer of sustainable design, an early champion of native species, and a visionary landscape designer.
Premiering tonight, Wednesday, June 10, an incredible live presentation by internationally renowned artist Jenny Holzer will take place at the Garden—and we hope you’ll join us for the opportunity to experience it! For four consecutive nights during our Frida al Fresco evenings, Jenny Holzer in conjunction with The Poetry Society of America and The New York Botanical Garden will present a program of scrolling light projections on the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory.
