NEWS about Botanical Art and for Botanical Artists

Gustavo Surlo wins First Prize in Margaret Flockton Award 2023

20/8/2023

Gustavo Surlo has won the First in the Margaret Flockton Award 2023. This award is very highly prized within the scientific botanical illustration community.

The Second Prize has been awarded to Juan Luis Castillo.

The Margaret Flockton Award is judged and hosted by the Botanic Gardens of Sydney’s botanical illustrators Catherine Wardrop and Lesley Elkan.

37 artists from 18 countries have been selected for the 2023 exhibition at the Australian Botanic Garden Mount Annan until Friday 20 October 2023. A total of 54 entries have been judged and 29 finalists will be exhibited on-site.

The images of illustrations selected for the exhibition can be seen in the Margaret Flockton Award 2023 album on Flickr

The Criteria used to judge the Award are as follows:

Accurate interpretation and portrayal of the plant characters and diagnostic features highlighted in the botanical description
Technical merit
Artistic merit
Composition
Reproducibility

First Prize: Gustavo Surlo - Wedelia sp. nov. (daisy)

Gustavo Surlo has won the AUS$5,000 First Prize in the 20th Margaret Flockton Awards (2023) for his illustration of his drawing of the newly found Wedelia species which is a member of the daisy family. Last year he was one of the artists who was Highly Commended.

Wedelia, a member of the daisy family by Gustavo Surlo

Gustavo's pieces show the Wedelia sp. nov. species with strength while capturing the delicate surface of the plant's textures. He has skilfully composed the illustration. The subtle use of lines and bars gives a sense of scale. We can understand the plant's role in its habitat and see its minute hairs and glands on the leaf surface. Lesley Elkan.

ABOUT GUSTAVO SURLO

graduated in Biological Sciences from the Federal University of Bahia
subsequently became a Margaret Mee Scholar at Kew in 2018.
He is a botanical illustrator and intern at the plant tissue culture laboratory of the UFBA Institute of Biology.

His Instagram post about his illustrationindicates his pleasure with his win. I recommend he now get himself a website!

I am immensely grateful to the organizers of this incredible initiative, which I have followed with delight for several years. I also thank the researchers who very kindly allowed the submission of the illustration and helped to understand the structures. Today an old dream comes true with Margaret Flockton Award

Second Prize: Phoenix canariensis by Juan Luis Castillo, Spain

The second prize is awarded to Phoenix canariensis (Canary Island date palm) by Juan Luis Castillo (Spain)

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Beverley Allen - 2023 Shirley Sherwood Award for Botanical Art

5/4/2023

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I was extremely pleased to find out last week that Australian artist Beverley Allen is the second recipient and 2023 winner of the Shirley Sherwood Award for Botanical Art. Notably this award is for a contribution to botanical art - and not just for being an excellent botanical artist.

I think she is a Modern Master par excellence and a very quiet force of nature! She's very definitely an excellent choice in terms of what she has done within the wider family of botanical art and illustration at both a national and international level. Very, very few have achieved as much as Beverley.

The Shirley Sherwood Award is an accolade presented once a year in recognition of an artist’s contribution to Botanical Art. The prestigious award includes a prize of £10,000 and a dedicated space in the Shirley Sherwood Gallery at The Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew to display a selected artwork for a year.

Beverley Allen with her painting of Strelitizia nicolai - featured in the "Modern Masterpieces of Botanical Art Exhibition" at Kew in 2019.

About the Shirley Sherwood Award for Botanical Art

Last year, Dr Shirley Sherwood inaugurated her new Shirley Sherwood Award for Botanical Art for an artist who has greatly contributed to the field of contemporary botanical art. The Award comprises:

a sum of £10,000 and
a dedicated space to exhibit work and highlight the artist's contribution in the Shirley Sherwood Gallery.

Two paintings of Strelitzia nicolai by Beverly Allen GM (RHS 2007, NYBG 2010) - see below - are now hanging in the Gallery. - at the end of Gallery 6. The one on the right was

the feature image of the exhibition The Shirley Sherwood Collection: Modern Masterpieces of Botanical Art - see Australasian Exhibit in 'Modern Masterpieces of Botanical Art' at Kew
used on the cover of the book produced in association with the exhibition.
featured in my review of the Australaisian artists in the exhibition

Beverly is a spectacular artist with bold and confident compositions. Full of clarity, vivid colour and stunning detail, her paintings beautifully capture the splendour of the natural world and have earned her both the RHS - Royal Horticultural Society Gold Medal and the inaugural Gold Medal for Botanical Art by the New York Botanical Garden.
Shirley Sherwood

Shirley Sherwood pictured last week (30.03.23.) at the Award Exhibition of Beverley's artwork in the Shirley Sherwood Gallery of Botanical Art at Kew.

This post is about Beverley Allen and why she won the award. It's a summarised account of her professional life and development of her contribution to botanical art on an international level. It is also full of photographs of Beverley that I've taken over the years!

Links in this post are to official websites or pages on this website.

Timeline about Beverley Allen and her art

Beverley Allen with her painting "Bambusa Vulgaris 'Striata' (Royal Botanic Garden, Sydney)" 2005 (watercolour on paper; 29" by 66" ) - at the 'Botanicals - Environmental Expressions in Art' Exhibition, at Kew Gardens in 2013. Collection: The Alisa and Isaac M. Sutton Collection

1945: born in 1945 in Sydney, Australia. She was awarded a BA in Fine Arts from Sydney University prior to developing a career as a graphic designer.
1997: She began studying botanical art and became a botanical artist in 1998.

She told me back in 2017 that she had - like very many other botanical artists - been greatly inspired by the cover illustration of Contemporary Botanical Artists which was the first ever book about botanical art by Shirley Sherwood. So below you can see the the inspiration - the painting of the 'Cape Blue Waterlily' by Pandora Sellers on the front cover. (Colleen and Beverley were in the Gallery as they were organising the upcoming exhibition by the Florilegium and I was fortunate that we met on the day her inspiration was on display!
(This painting is also on display at the moment in "The Wonderful World of Water Plants" exhibition at SSG.)

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Klei Sousa wins First Prize in Margaret Flockton Award 2022

25/10/2022

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Klei Sousa has won the First Prize in the 18th Margaret Flockton Award 2022. The award comes with $5,000 but is most prized for its highly prestigious nature within the scientific botanical illustration community.

Hippeastrum sp. nov. by Klei Sousa (Brazil)

An outstanding result for a long-time entrant in the MFA. Delicately rendered in ink on board with Klei’s trade-mark restraint, the perfect line and stipple had the judges straining to find a flaw (which they didn’t). The crucial white halos around foreground features help delineate form, avoiding confusion when layering. With every essential aspect comprehensively rendered in fine stipple, and with zero superfluous information, Klei brings together scientific accuracy and an experienced artistic sensibility in this beautiful plate.

This post covers: (in order)

About the Award - why it is prestigious and what's important in a winning illustration
About the two prizewinners and three artists whose illustrations were highly commended PLUS Judges comments
About the Exhibition at the Royal Botanic Garden in Sydney
How you can see the images online - and view the video presentation

You can also

REVIEW my dedicated page for The Margaret Flockton Award for Excellence in Scientific Botanical Illustration
see all the selected entries on Flickr in the RBG Sydney Flickr Album Margaret Flockton Award 2022
view the YouTube video about the Award (below).

The Margaret Flockton Award

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Call for Entries: "The Art of Botanical Illustration" at RBG Victoria

20/5/2022

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This year sees the 16th Biennial 'Art of Botanical Illustration' (TABI) Exhibition at the Royal Botanic Gardens Victoria in Melbourne.

This is one of the most prestigious botanical art exhibitions in Australia
Entry is open to international botanical artists.
It takes place at the same time as 7th Botanic Gardens Congress and will be an event which is part of the Friends 40th anniversary celebrations

Below you can find out more about the official Call for Entries for the Exhibition which will open on 16th September 2022. The deadline for entries is 1st August 2022.

My version reorganises the information for artists provided to make it rather easier to grasp some of the critical issues which will help you with decision-making about whether or not to enter. There's a little surprise about the cost for those not resident in Victoria...

Exhibition

The exhibition will take a hybrid format this year - with ALL artworks exhibited in both:

a physical exhibition held at Domain House, Melbourne
a virtual exhibition online.

It's considered that this hybrid approach will help capture a wide audience and in turn provide greater exposure to the artworks of nationally and internationally based botanical artists.

Venue: Domain House, Royal Botanic Gardens, Victoria
Virtual: Exhibition: - link to be provided at a later date
Dates: 16 September through to 2 October 2022

TABI 2022 will coincide with the 7th Global Botanic Gardens Congress (26th – 30th September 2022), which will be hosted by the Royal Botanic Gardens Victoria , RBGV, ( https://www.7gbgc.org/).

The theme of the Congress is Influence and Action: Botanic Gardens as Agents of Change with a particular focus on the response of Botanic Gardens to climate change, including plant conservation and climate resilience.

Call for Entries

The Friends of the Royal Botanical Gardens Victoria organise host the exhibition and organise the Call for Entries. They are inviting entries for the exhibition from all botanical artists.

You can find out more on:

the TABI 2022 page.
Information for Artists - which I'm summarising below.

The Selection Process will be based on DIGITAL images (i.e. no need to send your artwork to Melbourne) and the Information for Artists provides useful guidelines for how best to deliver these.

TABI 2022: Information for Artists

1. SELECTION CRITERIA

The artwork must adhere to the following selection criteria:

It must provide an accurate representation of the form and botany of the chosen subject.
The characteristics of the species or variety must be adequately conveyed.
The representation should be an artistically pleasing, balanced and a considered work of art.
It must be identified and named accurately according to standard botanical practices.
It must have been completed since TABI 2020.

The artworks selected for TABI 2022 must be both scientifically accurate and artistically pleasing. Each artwork is carefully selected against strict selection criteria by a panel of three professional judges, including a botanist and an experienced artist, to ensure the highest standards are met.
Information for Artists (Section 8: Selection process)

2. WHO CAN ENTER:

The Information for Artists could be less than somewhat opaque on this topic. Or maybe just a lot more transparent?

Essentially

anybody can submit entries
only those who are Friends of the Royal Botanic Garden Victoria - in a financial sense - can have their work hung in the exhibition. (See "Cost of Submission" below)

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Esmee Winkel wins Margaret Flockton Award 2021

7/6/2021

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Notoleptopus decaisnei, Esmee Winkel, The Netherlands

Esmee Somers Winkel has won the First Prize in the 17th Margaret Flockton Award 2021. The award comes with $5,000 but is most prized for its highly prestigious nature within the scientific botanical illustration community.

Esmee is a a professional scientific illustrator working in the Netherlands. This First prize follows on from

the Second Prize she won in 2017,
the Jill Smythies Award (2014) awarded by the Linnean Society and
her three RHS Gold Medals (2013, 2016 and 2018).

This post covers: (in order)

About the Award - why it is prestigiousâ€‹ and what's important in a winning illustration.
â€‹About the two prizewinners and three artists whose illustrations were highly commended PLUS Judges comments
About the Exhibition at the Royal Botanic Garden in Sydney
How you can see the images online - and view the video presentation.â€‹

The Margaret Flockton Award

Margaret Flockton Award is unique amongst international art awards, focusing exclusively on contemporary scientific botanical illustration, as distinct from botanical art RBG Sydney Flickr Album Margaret Flockton Award 2021

The Margaret Flockton Award is specifically about scientific botanical illustration. It's prestigious because it is the ONLY award dedicated to the excellence and expertise demonstrated by those who produce botanical illustrations to an exactly scientific standard for botany and botanists

As a result, entries are typically:

submitted by professional botanical illustrators - or those aspiring to be one.
related to plates produced for the record and for scientific botanical publications.

This competition and exhibition is International. Scientific botanical illustrators from around the world are invited by the curators of the exhibition at the Royal Botanic Garden in Sydney to:

digitally submit scientifically accurate taxonomic illustrations
i.e. highly detailed black and white drawings primarily undertaken in pen and ink, pencil or digitally rendered.
that accompany a published taxonomic description of the plant,
with the drawing clearly highlighting all of the distinctive features of the species.

REVIEW my dedicated page for The Margaret Flockton Award for Excellence in Scientific Botanical Illustration

The Criteria used to judge the Award are listed below:

Accurate interpretation and portrayal of the plant characters and diagnostic features highlighted in the botanical description
Technical merit
Artistic merit
Composition
Reproducibility

See A Guide to Scientific Illustration (on the Margaret Flockton Award page on the RBG website - at the bottom) for more information on judging criteria.

Reproducability is extremely important, because the nature of our work is that it is reproduced so anything too delicate can be lost on reduction.
â€‹Composition will usually be the thing that wins a work. If you can make a composition sing in terms of the way it tells the story of the plant you're doing well.
Comments by Lesley Elkan from the Facebook Live Event

While other awards will look for accurate interpretation and portrayal plus technical and artistic merit, this is the only award which specifically considers illustration from the perspective of the scope for reproduction in scientific publications (i.e. the whole purpose of the illustration is to communicate to a wide community of interest via printed or digital matter).

The Judges for the 2020 Award were all from the Royal Botanic Garden in Sydney.

Catherine Wardrop - RBG&CP Botanical Illustrator and Margaret Flockton Award Curator
Lesley Elkan - Botanical Illustrator
Dr Kerry Gibbons, RBG&DT Flora Botanistâ€‹

Apparently they had 25 illustrations two days before the deadline and on the Monday morning they had 103! Next year the Judges would appreciate receiving illustrations earlier if that's at all possible! :)

About the Prizewinners

I photographed Esmee Winkel with her RHS Gold Medal scientific botanical illustrations in 2016 - just after she'd given me her best tips for cleaning Rotring technical pens!

FIRST PRIZE ($5,000) Esmee Winkel, The Netherlands - for Notoleptopus decaisnei (ink)
(see illustration at the top of this post)

Esmee's illustrated has been awarded the First Prize for its exacting skilful technique and perfectly balanced composition. The clarity of the strong line is complemented by the perfectly rendered elements, with a concise stipple techniques used only where required to convincglu describe form. Line weight is also used to describe shadows and depth. The illustration reveals the life cycle and key features of
â€‹Judge's Comments

My commentary: I'm reading that as a lot of appreciation and applause for

a "less is more" approach to botanical illustration and
demonstrable and refined expertise in the full range of available techniques!

â€‹Plus note the smart move of illustrating an Australian plant!

Esmee Winkel is a professional scientific illustrator who specialises in botanical illustration and works as a Scientific illustrator and Botanical artist for the Naturalis Biodiversity Center in Leiden and at the Hortus Botanicus, Leiden in the Netherlands.

She has previously won second prize in the Margaret Flockton Award 2017.

Other prizes she has won include

2016: the Botanical Illustrator Award for Excellence in Scientific Botanical Art from the American Society of Botanical Artists (ASBA)
2016: a second RHS Gold Medal for her display of drawings of rare and endangered orchids in 2016 (see Interviews with RHS Botanical Art Gold Medallists - from the UK and Europe - and video below)
2014: the Jill Smythies Award for excellence in botanical illustration by the Linnean Society
2013: an RHS Gold Medal in 2013 for a set of meticulous and well-designed pen and ink drawings of Leguminosae (see Interviews with RHS Botanical Art Gold Medal Winners)
2012 - a BISCOT Gold Medal in 2012

You can read more about her in About Esmee Winkel, botanical illustrator at Naturalis

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Margaret Flockton Award 2021: Call for Entries

16/2/2021

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Last year, the Margaret Flockton Award had the most entries ever for this prestigious award for contemporary scientific botanical illustration.

This year, the organisers are expecting a repeat - and lots and lots of entries. So you need to make sure you enter your very best work!

46 artists from 21 countries submitted works in a time before the world paused.

Astoundingly, the total number of entries in 2020 reflected as a 50% increase on previous averages, with countries Bulgaria, Switzerland and Norway represented for the first time. Ink was far and away the most favoured medium for illustrating, with pencil a distant second of the traditional forms, while digital and mixed media continue their slow rise in the ranks.
Round Up of the entries received for the 2020 Award

Who can enter the Margaret Flockton Award?

Entries are welcomed from all those who generate scientific illustrations of plants.

All previous winners of the Margaret Flockton Award are eligible to enter, excluding the 2018, 2019 and 2020 first prize winning artists.

Typically, the people who submit illustrations for this award - and win awards - are professional botanical illustrators / people who produce scientific botanical illustrations for botanical gardens and botanists on a regular basis. However they' are NOT the only people who enter.

Enthusiastic botanical illustrators make up at least half the entries and this competition is NOT limited to those who generate income producing scientific botanical illustrations - and scientific illustration entries from a wider group are always welcomed.

Some of the illustrations from the Margaret Flockton Award 2020 - Flickr Gallery - click the pic to see more

What can you submit?

The page relating to the Award includes a Guide to Scientific Botanical Illustrations - which I recommend you read before processing any further.

Each artist may submit up to two illustrations. If you'd like to see the standard of work submitted you can view the 2020 Flickr Gallery for the Margaret Flockton Award 2020
Only full plate illustrations will be accepted (inclusive of habit study and diagnostic features of the species).
- Inclusion of scale bars, whilst not compulsory, is highly recommended.
Illustrations MUST be MONOCHROMATIC (i.e. not coloured - see above)
- EITHER black and white illustrations (for example created using pen and ink, graphite or scraperboard)
- AND/OR monochromatic, digitally rendered illustrations
- either published or unpublished
All illustrations MUST have been have been produced in the last two years i.e. after February 2019
There are very precise dimensions for the images you can submit
ONLY high resolution digital tiff or psd scans of the illustrations being entered will be considered. (Original artworks and paperwork sent via the postal system will no longer be accepted.)
There are no entry fees for the Margaret Flockton Award and Exhibition.
NOTE: Jpg or coloured file formats will not be accepted.

How to submit an entry

ALL the specific details regarding submission of artwork and paperwork can be found at https://www.rbgsyd.nsw.gov.au/Science/Botanical-Illustration/The-Margaret-Flockton-Award - scroll down to ‘Entry Requirements’.

All illustrations and paperwork must be submitted digitally. One high resolution digital image per illustration. The file size should not exceed 200MB

High resolution for judging and exhibiting:
- No photos of artworks will be accepted - scanned original works or digitally created images only.
- Ink line and stipple - Bitmap tiff @ 1200dpi
- Pencil or Continuous tone - Greyscale tiff or psd (NOT jpg)
(Colour files will NOT be accepted, please convert to greyscale) @ 600dpi (minimum).

You also need to submit a
- entry form
- labels
- biography
DEADLINE for submission of images: 12 March 2021 EST. (I think maybe the organisers need to identify a precise time and the time zone. If you want to be safe assume the day before as your deadline!)
How to submit your digital image(s) and entry form / labels / biography:
- via Dropbox (use Dropbox Basic for free access)
- upload your tiff or psd files to a shared folder
- label your folder YOURSURNAME MFA 2021
- make it shared by inviting botanical.illustration@rbgsyd.nsw.gov.au to View AND Edit files in the shared folder where you have uploaded your image files.
The Margaret Flockton Award Committee will contact you to confirm your image files have been received.

Note: Those who have already submitted images need to note that these will be processed along with all of the other entries after the deadline of March 12.

Judging

All entries will be evaluated based on the following criteria:

Accurate interpretation and portrayal of plant characters and diagnostic features noted in the botanical description
Technical merit
Reproducibility
Composition
Artistic merit

Margaret Flockton Award 2021 Exhibition

NEW Venue: The Calyx, Royal Botanic Garden Sydney
Exhibition Dates: Monday 7 June - 20 June 2021
Admission: Free

The exhibition will also be seen - on dates to be advised - at two additional venues within the Royal Botanic Gardens i.e.

Australian PlantBank, The Australian Botanic Garden Mount Annan.
Dates TBC 2021, Visitor Centre at The Blue Mountains Botanic Garden Mount Tomah

For all those who cannot get to Australia, the entries will also be available to view online in the Margaret Flockton Flickr Gallery which will be published on Friday 11 June, 2021

Ready, set & away we go. An operation in the heart of beautiful Sydney. The Calyx at the Botanic Garden is truely a site to check out. pic.twitter.com/ggT8EF7VA8
— Helivision Solutions (@DronesInOz) November 14, 2016

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The 15th Biennial Art of Botanical Illustration Exhibition at RBG Melbourne

26/9/2020

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The 15th Biennial Exhibition of The Art of Botanical Illustration 2020 (TABI) is presented by The Friends of the Royal Botanic Gardens Melbourne.

This year for the first time it is a Virtual ONLINE Exhibition. I guess, whichever country we live in we're now getting used to these in the age of the Pandemic.

The Friends are to be congratulated on producing a well constructed and beautiful online exhibition. I particularly like the fact that we get a profile for each artist included in the exhibition. It not only helps the artist with raising their profile - it also helps the buyers who often want to know more about "who painted this?"

About the 15th Biennial TABI Exhibition

The Virtual Exhibition is online from 19 September – 31 December 2020. All artworks are for sale and all profits from this exhibition assist the Friends to support the Royal Botanic Gardens Melbourne.

You can:

download the catalogue to see the full list of artwork selected for the exhibition. (Vicki Philipson painted the Agapanthus Seed Head used for the front cover)
view the exhibition online
review artists profiles and artwork per artist
purchase artwork in the exhibition
read about the History of the Art of Botanical Illustration Exhibitions

If you click the image of the artwork it takes you to a seperate page which lists more details about the artwork and includes the price. Postage is not included - but a link provides more information. All transactions are between the artist and the art collector.

Selection, Participating Artists and Prizes

SELECTION

Artwork is selected for the exhibition by a panel which includes a botanist, an artist and the head librarian at the Royal Botanic Gardens Melbourne to ensure that the highest standards are met.

All artwork exhibited must adhere to the following criteria:

it must provide an accurate representation of the form and botany of the chosen subject;
the characteristics of the species or variety must be adequately conveyed;
the representation should be an artistically pleasing, balanced and a considered work of art;
it must be identified and named accurately according to standard botanical practices; and
it must have been completed within the previous two years.

Below is a video of the opening of the exhibition and the announcement of the awards.
The awards and the artworks purchased for the State Botanical Art Collection are detailed below - against the artists name.

PARTICIPATING ARTISTS

The artists whose artwork was selected for the exhibition are as follows. Links in their name got to the exhibition website.

Amanda Ahmed
Haya Alketbi - Celia Rosser Honourable Mention for Pyrus sp
Beverly Allen - Celia Rosser Honourable Mention for Corymbia ficifolia cv.
Sally Armfield
Kelly Bassett
Amanda Blake-Sutterby Amyema linophylla - Buloke Mistletoe - purchased by the RBG Victoria for the State Botanical collection
Ila Blyth
Marie Bogoyevitch
Helen Burrows
Lucy Chapman
Brian Cheung
Deb Chirnside
Pratistha Chitrakar
Thea Clark
Niki Coates
Simon Deere
Sue Dixon
Rosemary Donnelly
Dianne Emery - Celia Rosser Award Winner for Amanita muscaria - fly agaric (SEE BELOW)

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