This year’s Caribbean Garden promises to be even more photogenic than the last! The picturesque fronds and flowers of the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory‘s permanent collection once again take the spotlight to promote not only the beauty you see, but the beauty you create.
Walk the pathways of the Conservatory on a tour of our verdant living collections. Award-winning photos from the International Garden Photographer of the Year contest–taken in gardens around the world–will be on display alongside plants from around the Caribbean. Enjoy the beautiful photographs and access additional information on the photographers, their inspiration, and the techniques they used to capture these stunning images by simply scanning a code on each sign with your smartphone. And on Sundays, join one of two accomplished photographers for a brief course on the basics of garden shooting.
Whether you’re green to the art or just looking to brush up on your technique, come for some winter weather relief and don’t forget your camera.
Mandy Disher - "The Beacon," First Place in Plant Portraits Year 3
Every day at The New York Botanical Garden offers countless opportunities to snap the perfect shot. A red-tailed hawk making pre-flight checks, a maple seed as it whirligigs from an overhead branch–each event happens almost casually, yet the challenge of capturing nature in just the right light, at the right time, is something our visiting photographers crave.
But there’s motivation beyond the thrill of capturing the perfect picture, thanks in large part to the nearly $8,000 in grand prize funds handed out through the International Garden Photographer of the Year competition. For the last five years, the contest has provided amateurs and professionals alike with an outlet for their photographs, and in turn earned the winners not only a check, but global recognition for their work. And with an entry fee of only £10 (around $16), there’s no reason to sit this year’s competition out.
It’s the second month of our photo contest, and a hearty congratulations to Barbara Reiner for winning our second monthly NYBG-IGPOTY photography contest. The NYBG photo judges had a tough time picking the winner this month, but in the end felt that Barbara’s rose triptych just edged out cindy {k}’s scene among the tulips for this month’s theme “American Beauty.” Barbara will receive a NYBG gift pack, which includes two All-Garden Passes, a $25 credit towards the Adult Education class of her choice, a catalog for the Library exhibition Historical Views: Tourists at the Alhambra, and the catalog from Hirschfeld’s Broadway Scrapbook. We’re also still working on getting copies of the photography book, Better Plant and Garden Photography, written by IGPOTY founder Philip Smith, over from the U.K. as well. Congratulations Barabara! Please send us an email with your contact information through this form (select website from the pull-down menu).
Butterflies take a lot of patience and you have to get through a lot of shots before the right one appears in the viewfinder. The winning shot is a great example of the way photography is really about light and about ‘chasing the light’. To achieve the vision of light filtered through a butterfly’s wing is a testament not only to patience but also to Heather Lang’s skill.
Butterfly by Heather Lang
The second placed shot by Patricia Gonzalez is actually my favourite–but then I am always attracted by humour and fun in images. This is a beautifully seen composition with the two photographers working visually in opposite directions. The foreshortening of the long lens makes them look as if they are close together, blissfully unaware of each other. This is a picture about passion and enjoyment–exactly what the category ‘Breathing Spaces’ in International Garden Photographer of the Year is all about. Patricia must have waited carefully for the exact moment when both photographers were looking through the viewfinder to create that sense of symmetry–very clever.
In the Rose Garden by Patricia Gonzalez
Can you get more photogenic than a lotus flower? The soft light falling on this bloom is exquisite. I think I might have wanted to shift position a bit to simplify the composition to exclude the foliage and maybe tell us a bit more about its context in NYBG, but there is a lot of atmosphere in this shot.
Lotus by Elizabeth Mueller
Thank you Philip! July isn’t even half over yet, plenty of time left to enter this month’s contest. The theme is “American Beauty.” Simply join the NYBG Group Pool on Flickr, and then tag your photo with nybgigpoty2. That’s it! At the end of the month we’ll convene a panel of photography experts and report back with the winners. Good luck, and keep snapping!
Coming in a close second is this photograph by Patricia Gonzalez which, humoursly (and literally) captures the theme with a pair of shutterbugs snapping away in the Peggy Rockefeller Rose Garden.
We had 35 photographs entered into this first contest, and the quality was really high. It was difficult settling upon a winner, so congratulations to Heather, Patricia, and Elizabeth!
For the July contest we have picked the theme “American Beauty.” Stumped? Don’t be! Be creative! Pictures needn’t be patriotic, or all red, white, and blue. Perhaps you snapped a shot of Benjamin Franklin’s choice to be our national bird–the turkey–walking around the grounds, or maybe you took a plant portrait of a rose with an all-American name. If you’re afraid we might miss the point of your photo, please include an explanation in the description area. For the July contest, please use the tag nybgigpoty2.
And let’s simplify matters a bit this month, too. Why doesn’t everyone just limit themselves to five photos. Don’t worry about entering one per week. Feel free to plop them all into the group, en masse. And as always, please let me know if you have any questions.
Hello everybody, Ann here. I’m back from my summer vacation, jet-lagged but so happy to be home for this beautiful New York City weather! My intention of blogging from the road was pure, but I was thwarted by technology. Who would have ever expected it would be so hard to find reliable wifi (or “weefee” as they say in France) in London and Paris? Regardless, I had a great, garden-inspired trip. Here are some pictures I snapped on a rainy day visit to the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew.
IGPOTY Exhibition at Kew
If you win one of the categories or special commendations in the IGPOTY contest, your photos will be on display at this beautiful outdoor exhibition at Kew Gardens. The photos are printed onto a special kind of vinyl and hang outside year-round. The exhibition is right near the main gate, and is therefore one of the first stops for Kew’s many visitors. The quality of the winning IGPOTY photographs is extraordinary, so hone your chops by joining in on one of our monthly photo contests. I can’t wait to see at least one photo from NYBG hanging here next year!
The Temperate House at Kew Gardens
There are three main glasshouses at Kew, and many smaller, secondary houses as well. They are very old and very lovely.
Staircase to the Temperate House Walkway
Both the Temperate House and the Palm House have catwalks around the upper levels that you access by climbing these mysterious-looking, vine-laden staircases.
The View from the Temperate House Catwalk
These catwalks give you an unusual perspective on trees that is nearly impossible to gain in nature.
Don't Forget to Bring a Brolly
As might be expected, rain is a common occurrence, so don’t forget to bring an umbrella. Of course, if you forget yours, though (like I did), the shop sells very nice ones.
Sheltering from the Rain
Should you choose not to use an umbrella, however, there are plenty of trees to shelter under while waiting for the showers to pass. This one is near the Sackler Crossing, a really cool walkway/bridge over Kew’s big lake.
King Willam
One of my favorite things at Kew was this garden known at King William’s Temple. It is planted with flowers, trees, shrubs, and herbs from the Mediterranean, and smells divine, especially in the rain. It is full of lavendar, rosemary, olive trees, cypresses, and so many other plants. It reminded me quite a lot of our current exhibition, Spanish Paradise: Gardens of the Alhambra.
A Typical English Garden
Just before I met up with two of my colleagues at Kew, I dashed through the Plant Families Beds and the Student Vegetable Plots just as the sun peeked out. This garden at the entrance to this area, at least to my mind, exemplifies everything that is beautiful about the English garden. It is a profusion of colors, heights, and textures, and is a joy to behold.
Badgers!
We’ve got beavers, Kew’s got badgers! I think I know which one I would prefer to run into on a dusky forest trail ….
The Palm House
And finally, I couldn’t possibly leave you without a shot of the structure that probably helped inspire the Garden’s founder, Nathaniel Lord Britton, to push the great men of New York City to found The New York Botanical Garden. The Palm House is an absolutely breathtaking work of engineering, and a great thing of beauty.
If you love The New York Botanical Garden, and you find yourself with a few days in London, you should absolutely go visit Kew Gardens. There are, inevitably, a lot of similarities between Kew and NYBG, but England’s climate, and Kew’s history, make the 30 minute trip out to Kew entirely worthwhile. I hope you have enjoyed my very brief tour of Kew, and that you’ll stay tuned next week for my adventures at Claude Monet’s garden in Giverny.
Special thanks to Mary from IGPOTY for showing me around Kew, and to Claire and Nicola at Kew for the cup of tea.
The Sun Sets on the Palm House at Kew by Jeff Eden - Winner of the IGPOTY special commendation for Best Image of Kew
Happy Monday everyone! Ann Rafalko here, editor of Plant Talk and Director of Online Content at NYBG, to let you know that Plant Talk is going on vacation. Or, more precisely, I’m going on vacation, and I’m taking you with me!
I’ll be visiting a few of the world’s greatest gardens, and sharing my adventures with you, right here on Plant Talk. Additional posting will be light, so stay tuned for this special two-week adventure.
In just a few hours I will be hopping the pond to London where I’ll be visiting a few of my colleagues at Kew. I will also be taking a look at the IGPOTY exhibition (where at least one talented NYBG visitor’s photograph will be on display next year!), visiting the Chelsea Physic Garden, and checking out some of the best gardening shops the capital city has to offer. Then, on Friday, I’ll be heading to the City of Lights for a few days. I’m hoping to visit Monet’s garden at Giverny (more on why soon!), and to explore how the Parisians fit gardens into their historic urban landscape.
So stay tuned, and if you have any tips on garden-related places I should visit while in London and Paris, please feel free to leave a comment below. Bon voyage!
Summer, regardless of whether or not the calendar says so, is here. So let’s make “Picturing Summer at the Garden” the theme for this inaugural monthly NYBG-IGPOTY contest on Flickr!
But first, let’s set some ground rules:
1.Photos must be taken at The New York Botanical Garden, but needn’t be from this month, year, or even decade. Please make sure they adhere to the theme and that you own the copyright to them.
2. Please enter only one photo per calendar week. That means in June you can enter up to five (5) photos, but please submit them a week apart. The weeks of June are defined as: Week 1, 6/1 – 6/4; Week 2, 6/5 – 6/11; Week 3, 6/12 – 6/18; Week 4, 6/19 – 6/25; and Week 5, 6/26 – 6/30.
3. For your photograph to be considered, it must be placed into the NYBG Group Pool and be tagged with the term NYBGIGPOTY.
4. The NYBG Flickr Pool is moderated by NYBG staff. While we work a lot, we tend to not work in the evenings and on weekends, so if your photo does not immediately show up in the pool, that is why; it just hasn’t been approved yet. If several days go by, or if Monday afternoon comes around and your photo still hasn’t shown up in the pool, please let us know.
5. In the spirit of IGPOTY, please feel free to comment on each others photos (nicely, please) and to share tips, tricks, techniques, and stories.
6. One monthly winner and one or two runner’s up will be chosen by a panel of NYBG staff and friends of the Garden. We’re hoping to get commentary on the photos from IGPOTY’s staff as well!
7. The winner will receive a small prize from us, but we haven’t figured out what that will be yet. Stay tuned!
The Enid A. Haupt Conservatory (photo by Ivo M. Vermeulen)
The New York Botanical Garden has officially signed on to be the exclusive U.S. partner of the International Garden Photographer of the Year contest (also known as IGPOTY). We couldn’t be more delighted! To celebrate our partnership, and our 120th anniversary, IGPOTY is even offering a special commendation for the best photograph taken here at the Garden. The winner will receive a free year’s Membership to NYBG.
For those new to IGPOTY, it is the world’s premier garden photography contest. The competition is a rolling program that follows the gardening year. The categories include: “Beautiful Gardens,” “Wildlife Havens,” “Breathing Spaces,” “Bountiful Earth,” “Trees Wood Forest,” “Fragile Landscapes,” and “Greening the City.” Entries for the sixth contest are now open, and must be received by November 30, 2011. Finalists will be announced in February 2012 and winners will be announced in April 2012.
Winners receive a monetary prize of £5,000 (approximately $8,000), are published in an annual book, and are displayed in a public exhibition at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, and for the first time in the U.S. at The New York Botanical Garden. The fee for entering the competition, which covers the expense of mounting and touring the exhibition, is £10 (approximately $16) for four single images, or £25 (approximately $40) for a portfolio (a set of six themed images). The contest is open to all photographers, both professional and amateur. Photographers who are under 16 years old may enter for free. Learn more and register to submit photos here.
Above the Peggy Rockefeller Rose Garden (photo by Ivo M. Vermeulen)
In addition, there are other categories and awards. Themed, seasonal competitions, collectively called “4Seasons,” run throughout the year, with upcoming deadlines for the those themed categories on May 31, August 31, and November 30. “Spirit of the American Garden” is a standalone award with a cash prize that can be entered into any category mentioned above. Other standalone prizes include “Best Image of Kew” and the “Best Image of The New York Botanical Garden” to commemorate the Garden’s 120th anniversary.
Hardy Waterlily (photo by Michelle Longo)
One of the truly great things about the IGPOTY contest (aside from the amazing recognition and monetary prize) is the ability to ask for a critique of the photos you enter into the contest from the panel of judges. It takes the judges some time to give this feedback, but according to my contact at IGPOTY, it is one of the most satisfying aspects of the contest for both entrant and judge alike.
Japanese Anemone and Bee (photo by Ivo M. Vermeulen)
In that pedagogical spirit and as an effort to help hone everyone’s skills, we will be hosting monthly themed contests on the NYBG Flickr Group Page. We’ll hold the first one in June. So in the meantime, we’re asking out shutterbug friends to head over to Flickr and to share the best picture they’ve ever taken at NYBG and to actively discuss the photos, what they love and where they see areas for improvement (but please play nicely). It’s fun to see what each person considers “best,” so please join in! To say that we’re thrilled by this amazing partnership would be an understatement. We hope you’re as excited as we are. Happy snapping everyone!
This year’s Caribbean Garden promises to be even more photogenic than the last! The picturesque fronds and flowers of the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory‘s permanent collection once again take the spotlight to promote not only the beauty you see, but the beauty you create.
