Author: Gaynor's Flora

5 days until the set-up for RHS exhibition

| Gaynor's Flora

My worries at the beginning of today was not purely about botanical art and the RHS exhibition.

Last night I dropped my iPad on the floor. This morning I noticed that the corner was smashed and there was a big crack across it!

I use the iPad so much in communicating at the moment. On my computer I have so many screens up at the same time trying check that all the information I have is correct. I am also writing information panels about crab apples generally and each picture specifically, linking in parts of the pictures painted to give a good description of the exhibit.

With no iPad, how could I write about the results of the judging next Thursday? You would have had to wait until I got back home after the exhibition had finished on Saturday evening. How we depend on modern technology now!

In fact I am very lucky as once I had found out where I could get a new screen put on the IPad, my husband took it to the town where it could be repaired on the spot. He returned with it having been done – several hours later. I continued flapping in the shed whilst he was away!

Well I am reasonably happy with the generic description of crab apples, and the first specific information panel. My husband checked it out and he only found a couple of mistakes!! Hopefully I will get the other five written tomorrow, at the same time as doing the laundry.

Now the last glimpse of the Malus x sylvestri ‘John Downey’ in coloured pencil before going onto another crab apple tomorrow.

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6 days until the set-up for the RHS exhibition

| Gaynor's Flora

As a botanical artist I would much prefer to paint or draw, than anything else. But my husband reminded me that in whatever you choose to do, there are always some aspects of it you would prefer not to spend too much time on.

I enjoyed getting all the information together for the six crabapple pictures in preparation for the RHS exhibition; I enjoyed the sketching, the planning, the study and drawing using a microscope and then getting down to the actual painting.  But, I haven’t enjoyed the last couple of weeks quite so much. I feel as though I am stuck behind the computer with no way to turn.

The colour matching of the pictures is now completely finished and I am satisfied with the results. What am I doing now?

I am going through all the information that I have on the crabapples – individually and generically. I realise that in some areas I might need slightly more information as some aspects of what I have found out can be confusing. I need to put it into a simple format so that people can cast their eyes over it quickly and learn something new. I have started writing a bit about the crabapples in general. All that I have gleaned is interesting, but hopefully people will want to spend more time on the artwork than the writing. I suppose this means me spending ages on this to sift out unnecessary stuff.

A week from now and I will know how I have done. I have asked before if you will either keep your fingers crossed for me or, preferably pray. I just hope that I have enough time to get all that I want to do – done.

Now a glimpse of the ‘John Downey’ crabapples.

Malus x sylvestris 'John Downey', in Coloured pencil
Malus x sylvestris ‘John Downey’, in Coloured pencil

7 days until the Set-up for the RHS exhibition

| Gaynor's Flora

For anyone who might just be picking up on this for the first time; for the last three years I have been preparing six pictures to exhibit at the next RHS Botanical art exhibition. It is to be held in London at the RHS’s Lindley Hall, 11-12 April.

The pictures are of six different crabapples, Malus ‘Red Jade’, Malus ‘Evereste’, Malus x robusta ‘Red Sentinel’, Malus x atrosanguinea ‘Gorgeous’, Malus x zumi ‘Golden Hornet’.  Each of them are in coloured pencil and are of ripe crabapples, dissected crabapples, crabapple blossom, Longitudinal section of the flower, enlarged stamen, style & stigma and a transverse section of the ovary. Each picture basically shows in detail the times when people are most interested in the life of a crabapple tree.

Normally one sees the tree covered with blossom later on in April to early May and the next time one is interested is when the tree is covered with red or yellow apples. But do people really look at the trees, the blossom or the apples? Very rarely. For example, they assume that the blossom is the same on each tree. But they are very different.

I wanted to show the beauty of the trees right down to the detail. But I also wanted to create beautiful pictures of the whole works. Obviously it is up to those who view the pictures as to whether I have succeeded or not. It will also be up to the judges at the RHS as to whether I get a medal or not.

The judging is carried out by the picture committee and these include botanical artists, botanists, and photographers. They have extremely strict criteria and I will be judged on my worst picture. This means that they are not only judging for correctness of botanical detail, but also how I use the medium I have chosen, the composition, the information I have provided in and with the picture, and the way I have presented the exhibit. They want to see that my work is consistent and that is why the worst picture is judged: Bearing in mind, no picture is ever 100% perfect!

Today I have had to re-do one of the pictures for colour matching in Photoshop. I discovered this morning (after I had spent all morning teaching), that one of the pictures was incorrectly colour matched. Why do I need this? I will be using segments of the pictures (as I have shown you in the blog) to provide further information about each each picture at the exhibition. Additionally, I will be able to get gicleé prints from these – although that is of lesser importance at the moment.

It is now dark, so I will have to wait until tomorrow to see if I have succeeded with this or not. In the meantime, I am getting as much information as possible about the crabapples I have chosen. And now, a glimpse of the next picture, the M. John Downey. Now these are very different to the M. Red Jade, M. Evereste and M. Red Sentinel that you have seen in earlier blogs – aren’t they?

Malus x sylvestris 'John Downey' blossom- in coloured pencil
Malus x sylvestris ‘John Downey’ blossom- in coloured pencil

 

 

 

8 days to the RHS exhibition set-up

| Gaynor's Flora

Time is going very quickly at the moment. The sun is shining beautifully again today and it is warm. The cats have taken shelter in the shed with me.

I am searching for any morphological information about crabapples to use in my signage. But I am finding little. Perhaps because I’m not looking in the right place with the right keywords. Any help would be gratefully received!

 

This is a very short blog, but it includes a little taster of the Malus Red Sentinel picture. The dissections. I noticed that the Crab apples looked rather brown on the blog yesterday, although in reality they are a beautiful red with some pink glimpses and some orangey colours.

Malus Red Sentinel dissections in Coloured pencil
Malus Red Sentinel dissections in Coloured pencil

9 days until set-up of RHS exhibition

| Gaynor's Flora

We have had a lovely weekend in relation to the weather. The sun has been shining and it has been a lovely temperature. I have been in the shed except for during Sunday lunch yesterday – which was Mothering Sunday.

My neck and shoulders are getting to me and I am a day later than I planned. I have actually finished doing the colour matching except for one or two tweaks.

The garden is beginning to look quite spring-like. Although we had some mild weather when the Magnolia started flowering, we had a cold blast which turned it off white. It is still going strong, but there are a lot of tepals lying on the ground now.

The Camellia have been flowering, but the cold blast sent the white ones brown and the red ones brown-tinged. The tulips are fantastic and you already know that we have plenty of Daffodils and a few Jonquil.

The Malus Evereste has now got tight flower buds on it. Can you imagine that the season is starting all over again?

I showed you the flower of the Malus Red Sentinel last time. Now I will show you the apples.

As with all the crab apple pictures, this too is in coloured pencil.

Malus x robusta ‘Red Sentinel’ blossom

 

 

11 days until set-up of RHS exhibition

| Gaynor's Flora

Time is running away from me! Most of the week that has gone by I was teaching – and enjoying it. But that means that preparation for the RHS exhibit has been left to one side. Today I am back doing the colour matching with Photoshop.

But before I show you a snippet from the next finished picture, I will show you one resulting from last week’s workshop.

I am not sure if it is fortunate or unfortunate, but every time I teach I want to do some of what the students are doing. I always need to demonstrate techniques anyway and I am often left with a half finished small picture – depending upon how many there are in the class. In fact, I often find that I continue to work on what I’ve started into the evening. My poor husband!

If it is a full class, then all my time is spent either demonstrating or going from person to person constantly. If it is a smaller class, I have to make myself look away from what they are doing so that they can actually start getting something wrong (but not too wrong). I find that if I hang over them too much, they don’t get a chance to do this and then they don’t learn. That is why I prefer to have several students at a time rather than a one-to-one. Although, for some people a one-to-one is essential.

These are Jonquil in graphite. It is a very small picture. I have been asked to give a small picture to a charity, so this will be it.

Jonquil flowers - graphite
Jonquil flowers – graphite

But the next RHS picture ready is Malus Red Sentinel. I think that many people have this crab apple in their gardens as it is quite common. When my grandchildren were smaller they called it a ‘tomato tree’. If you have been following this blog, you will know that we now have several ‘tomato trees’.

Make a note of the new leaves on this crab apple. They often have a slight red tinge round the edge when new.  The flowers are fairly simple showing up a pale pink. Although on a bright Spring day against a clear blue sky they look really exotic.

Malus Red Sentinel Blossom - Coloured pencil
Malus Red Sentinel Blossom – Coloured pencil

 

 

From Sketching to drawing – learn to draw botanical images workshop.

| Gaynor's Flora

Today was the last day of the workshop concentrating on sketching and drawing skills – which is a necessity when creating botanical art images.

It was again a super workshop; as regards the participants. My husband always says that such lovely people join us for the workshops. They seemed very interested and commented upon how well they had progressed over the three days.

The first day was used in sketching and drawing simple shapes, from apples, bananas, grapes and cups. In fact it seemed that the forms we are most used to were the most difficult – the upside down cup caused the most problem.

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I have a very simple way of teaching the use of perspective in botanical art, so placing elements in space seemed less of an issue.

The second day was spent on working up a daffodil from sketch, through tonal drawing, to completed graphite picture . At least, the completed graphite picture was not done until today.

I deliberately chose daffodils as this gave a greater challenge than many simple flowers. The gardens are full of them too, so it all made sense.

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This afternoon, I was told that they hadn’t thought that they would be able to complete the workshop with a reasonable result. In fact, they and I were thrilled with the results. What do you think?
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16 days until the RHS botanical art exhibition set up.

| Gaynor's Flora

I have spent the day Photoshopping the Crab apple pictures and there is another glimpse at the end of this blog.

But this evening I was at a meeting with my Bosham artist colleagues. The Chichester open Studios art trail is during the first two weekends in May, this will include the bank holiday Monday.

In the beautiful village of Bosham lives a whole enclave of artists using different media. We are going to start the art trail a little early on Friday 2 May with a preview at each of the artist’s studios. This will be between. 17:00 to 20:00.

Hopefully, people living in the vicinity will get the opportunity to see what is on display in a relaxing environment. More about this soon.

Tomorrow and for a further two days, I will be teaching the workshop ‘From sketch to drawing – learn to draw botanical images’.

So many have problems with their initial drawings and plans for their botanical paintings. Unfortunately, it is often the case that one finds out by having experienced it, that the final painting will only be as good as the line drawing. Those on the workshop have already understood this and hope to improve their drawing skills.

But, this is another part of Malus Evereste.

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Seventeen days before RHS botanical art exhibition set up.

| Gaynor's Flora

I set to work again as soon as we got home from church today. Although there is plenty of light in the shed I don’t know if it rains or shines. But I do know that on going up to the house for tea refills etc. it was very cold today.

This is a small glimpse of my working environment at the moment – concentrated computering; but with the odd intrusion.

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It is not what I enjoy the most. I much prefer coloured pencil painting. But it is one step nearer getting the pictures finished for exhibition at the RHS. Don’t forget the date at the RHS Lindley Hall in London, 11 – 12 April, but with the awards given on the 10th. I hope people are either praying or keeping their fingers crossed for me.

A couple of days ago I showed the blossom for the Malus Evereste. These are the crab apples.

I first saw them during a workshop about three years ago, when a student brought them along to paint. I was very taken with their stripey look, but also that a few of them had an extra ‘lumpy’ skirt on them. They reminded me of a ‘cottage loaf’.

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