Book Review: In Ruskin's Footsteps

The catalogue for In Ruskin's Footsteps - the England and Wales contribution to the Botanical Art Worldwide initiative is considerably smaller than the last BAW book I reviewed (see Book Review: 'Éireannach - Celebrating Native Plants of Ireland'). 

​That said, it is also packed full of content.

The back and front cover of the exhibition catalogue

Its creation was organised by the Association of British Botanical Artists (ABBA) and supported by the Dawn Joliffe Botanical Art Bursary awarded by the Royal Horticultural Society.

The catalogue format is an A5 sized paperback with a glossy and very colourful cover. 
Within that cover there are 64 pages which comprise:
Committee and Judges

• details of those who sat on the Association of British Botanical Artists Committee that organised the exhibition and associated events
• the names and credentials of those who acted as jurors for this open exhibition

Background:

• an explanation of the purpose of the exhibition together with background about of ABBA - which was created to organise the exhibition for artists living in England and Wales
• a very brief summary of Native Plants in England and Wales and some examples. I thought it unfortunate that this omitted the precise meaning of "native indigenous plants" and exactly how these vary from those that grow in the country now - after very many imports of plants from overseas. It assumes people know and yet visitors may well be people who are not botanists or botanical artists and/or do not NOT properly understand the terms 'native' or 'indigenous' within the context of plant life - and consequently why this exhibition is different from other exhibitions they may have seen. 
• the role of the Peter Scott Gallery within Lancaster University - and an explanation of the connection between the name of the exhibition and the venue as a home for the work of Ruskin.
• statements about Partnership conservation organisations

A page about the Plant - Example is March helleborine painted by Claire Kathleen Ward

Plants

• Wvery artwork is given one A5 page for an image, name of the plant in terms of latin and common name and the name of the artist and the media used - plus an explanation about the painting
• Overall, the quality of the image reproduction is very good but I was left wanting bigger images. The images are not untypical of many small catalogues (i.e. typically around 4x3inches). The quality of the scanning and printing appears to have captured a lot of detail.
• The text is the artist's explanation of the plant. The voice of each artist is clear and present and each talk about similar points e.g. reasons for choosing the plant, how they sourced it and what is known about it in terms of its habit and uses past and present. However I tended to very much prefer the text of those like Kew illustrator Christobel King who focus on the plant alone and the challenges it presents for presentation and how she tackled this in her artwork
• (Note: The website also provides images of the artwork)

Artists Profiles

• each artist gets a profile. I'm afraid with my 'adviser on artist statements' hat on I dearly wanted to edit some of the profiles. I felt this was a section which would have benefited from an edit to make it much more succinct when read as a whole.
• While it was good to see the domain names of the artists websites included, they weren't obvious and I'd have liked to have seen these more easily (eg underlined or italicised maybe)

End Pages

• the end pages provide a good visual insight into some of the kit and working processes of botanical artists in terms of studies done prior to the final work. It was good to see the sketchbook work and the notes.

In my desire for bigger images, I did try working out whether this might have been possible. It occurred to me that maybe a landscape format in A5 might have worked better in terms of enlarging images and constraining the number of words allowed, 

Distribution
Very sensibly ABBA has decided to sell the catalogue around the world. I know a lot of botanical artists and organisations involved with the Botanical Worldwide initiative are very keen to see what other people have produced - and it's great to see an organisation that is making this possible.  I suspect the size of the catalogue was determined in part by the need to make postage easier and I commend ABBA for doing this.

It's very nice to have large books but they can cost a lot to send as well as produce.  In this case keeping the publication compact makes the price more reasonable. I particularly liked the fact that the price includes all postage and packing so you know straight away when looking at prices what buying a copy is going to cost you. In terms of pricing, I suggest you click the links as the catalogue has three different prices depending on whether you are located in the UK, Europe or the rest of the world. There's also a discount for buying more than one copy.  

Conclusion
In summary, the catalogue is a little slow in 'arriving' in terms of its content. In essence the catalogue content is the wrong way round. 

For the visitor who knows nothing about the background to the exhibition, what they need from this particular exhibition catalogue is a very brief introduction about 'Botanical Art Worldwide', the reason for the focus on native and indigenous plants - with an explanation of what these are - and a brief explanation about the exhibition title. Followed by the explanation about the artwork, plants and artists up front. The rest is interesting - but is not what the exhibition is primarily about. 

Naturally for a one-off exhibition like this, I recognise that it's important to create a record of the 'workings' i.e. how it came about, who was involved and who did what in terms of both people and organisations. However this is a historical record and in my opinion, the explanations about the Committee and Judges and the organisations that were involved and supported could have come at the end and not lost any value as a record - while very much enhancing the exhibition experience via the catalogue for visitors - and for those buying the catalogue even if they have not seen the exhibition.

Special event 9th June 2018

There is to be a second special event at the Peter Scott Gallery on the 9th June. No booking is required and all events are free entry. The events are:

• 11am – 12 noon - a tour of the exhibition by Martin Allen who works in native plant conservation and is also an RHS Gold Medal winning botanical artist.
• 2pm – 3pm and will be led by Sarah Morrish. The theme of the talk is ‘Fieldwork and Research Techniques for Botanical Art’.  This will give aspiring and more experienced botanical artists an overview of how best work to in the field and how you can then research your subject further, through direct investigation of the subject and additional research techniques - from botany to paper. Sarah's working background  is in ecology / conservation and she  is an experienced tutor, botanical and natural science artist.​

Book reviews of other exhibition catalogues

• Book Review: 'Éireannach - Celebrating Native Plants of Ireland'
• Book Review:  The Illustrated College Herbal. Plants from the Pharmacopoea Londinensis of 1618 (the exhibition opens in August 2018)
• Book Review: Tulipa Tulipae - El tulipan ilustrado
• Book Review: "The Florilegium: The Royal Botanic Gardens Sydney: Celebrating 200 Years"