Cyclamen intaminatum by Jenny Brasier (Cyclamen intaminatum) Collection of the Victoria & Albert Museum

​A study by Jenny Braiser in the collection of the V&A Museum.
"This is a preparatory study for an illustration showing different examples of the cyclamen species painted for publication in the Cyclamen Society Journal. Having produced several working drawings towards the finished plate, the artist decided to record this process by transferring the original work relating to the colour forms of one species--the Cyclamen intaminatum--to a single sheet."
Study Room resource: Botanical illustration | V&A 

"Jenny Brasier is not a professional artist but was encouraged by Wilfrid Blunt and John Whitehead to draw and paint plants (Colour Plate 112); she excels at the portrayal of leaves (see the preliminary pages of this book)."
The Art of Botanical Illustration - page 300

"Jenny Brasier’s work is highly versatile and very beautiful with some of her brilliant, jewel-like watercolours on vellum having the intense quality of medieval illuminated manuscripts."
Shirley Sherwood

Cyclamen pseudibericum 1993 by Jenny Brasier - on a sheet of Rory McEwen's Vellum - exhibited at the Modern Masterpieces exhibition at the Shirley Sherwood Gallery at Kew in 2019

Janet Pope with her medal winning exhibit at the RHS Botanical Art Show in 2019.

Potatoes - shoots, roots, skin, flesh - Solanum tuberosum - by Janet Pope (RHS Silver Medal 2019)

About Janet Pope
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Society of Botanical Art Awards and Certificates
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Rosane Quintella in 2018 at the Worldwide Exhibition of Botanical Art in Brazil.

Rosane Quintella front second from left - with her fellow Margaret Mee Scholars in in Curitiba, Brazil: Back row: Maria Alice Rezende, Alessandro Cândido, Gustavo Marigo, Marcos A. Silva-Ferraz, and Paulo Ormindo. Front Row: Carol de Bassi, Rosane Quintella, Diana Carneiro and Fatima Zagonel

​O Centro de Ilustração Botânica do Paraná está de luto. Uma grande amiga nos deixou hoje pela manhã. Querida Rosane, que falta vamos sentir daquela sua risada contagiante! Um caminho de muita luz é o que nós, seus amigos, desejamos pra você. Vá em paz, Flor do Dia!

Rosane Quintella (1959 - 2020)

​The Paraná Botanical Illustration Center is in mourning.
A great friend left us this morning.
Dear Rosane, we will miss that contagious laugh from you!
A path with lots of light is what we, your friends, wish for you.
Go in peace, Flower of the Day!

Lizzie Sanders in her studio

"many of us were fortunate to have been taught by Lizzie at the Botanics and even more of you will have been familiar with her stunning work.

Lizzy was the doyenne of dry brush work. To watch her in action was a joy, to try and replicate her technique took considerable practice, time and a shed load of patience. "

Sutherland Kale © Lizzie Sanders - painted for Flora Scotia in 2018 and featured in the introduction to the Catalogue "Scottish Plant Lore"

Favourites are always bold, structural plants which themselves make a grand statement and which lead to careful, sometimes unconventional, composition.
from her website

Lizzie Sanders Timeline

Artwork by Lizzie Sanders

James Sherwood attended all the Private Views for exhibitions of botanical art at the Shirley Sherwood Gallery of Botanical Art - this is the one for the British Artists in the Collection in 2017

We're so sad to say that Shirley's husband James B. Sherwood passed away peacefully last night. He'd been in hospital for the past few months after a major operation and we hoped he'd pull through but it was all just too much of a fight, even for someone as mighty as Jim.
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You might have known him as the founder of shipping empire Sea Containers. Or the man who brought the Orient Express train back to life and built an entire luxury hotel brand around it. Or perhaps the consummate entrepreneur who always had projects in the pipeline. We just knew him as Jim - always on the move with a razor-sharp mind, a passion for Bridge, a loyal group of friends and colleagues all over the world and a family who loved and admired him.

James Sherwood (with stick) in discussion with Bryan Poole a fine art printmaker of botanical art - at the Private View for British Botanical Artists in the Shirley Sherwood Collection

Hazel Morris (21st June 1945 - 30th January 2020)

It is with great sadness that I inform you of the death of Hazel Forsyth Morris who passed away peacefully this morning in St Columba’s Hospice. 

Hazel had been unwell for sometime.  She was positive about her illness and determined to carry on with as much of her life as possible, without sharing her anxieties with others. 

Hazel was a founder member of the SSBA in 2014 and became a Trustee and Director. She was the first Chairperson, a role that she undertook for four years with dedication and pride.  She continued contributing to the SSBA as a Director and Trustee during 2019.

Her major contribution was the establishment of the SSBA annual exhibitions through her Chairing and co-ordination of the Exhibitions Committee.  Most recently in November 2019 Hazel was pleased to be asked to present Mary O’Neill with the ‘People’s Award’ from the Whitehouse Gallery Exhibition.  An exhibition that was a result of Hazel's hard work and negotiations. 

Hazel is known to many Botanical Artists whom she met at the Royal Botanic Gardens in Edinburgh and classes held by Fiona and Robert McNeill.  She also met many international artists through her work with the BISCOT committee that she joined in 2010 and was latterly the artist's contact person. She always acknowledged that she learnt so much about exhibiting from her BISCOT colleagues and friends.

Hazel loved snowdrops and tulips so I thought I would share with you her painting of a snowdrop that has been on the SSBA web site for some time. 

Hazel on Hazel - her SSBA profile ​ You can see Hazel's profile in relation to her botanical art on the  SSBA website. You can read what she has to say about herself and her botanical art below. The image at the top of this post is of Hazel at the Callander Park exhibition where her iris painting was 'Commended'.

I began my adult working life as a Home Economics teacher, and painted in watercolours, mainly landscapes, as a hobby and a way of relaxing.

After marrying, I accompanied my civil engineer husband as he worked mainly abroad, making homes and living in a number of countries in the Far East before returning to the UK to care for elderly parents. It was only after these family commitments were discharged that I was able to start thinking about taking up painting again.

I had been very interested in botanical painting for a number of years, influenced mainly, I think, by the work of Elizabeth Blackadder whose botanical paintings I saw regularly in Festival art exhibitions, and was fascinated by, complete with coffee stains, obvious alterations, and other marks on them; and yet, the marks somehow far from detracting, seemed to add to their artistic integrity.

However, it was only after picking up a booklet for educational courses at the RBGE that the possibility of studying this fascinating and complex form of art became a reality. I have now been painting botanical art for about nine years and attend Fiona Strickland’s class weekly.

In 2010 I was asked to join the committee of Botanical Images Scotia (BISCOT) and this has afforded me the opportunity of seeing at first hand, some of the best and most original work being created in botanical illustration today.

Snakes Head Fritillaries by Hazel Morris

Hazel centre back of Fiona Strickland's Botanical Art Ladies in the weekly class at Falkirk

Hazel Morris - drawing a specimen in her sketchbook in class

Mally Francis with her painting of Babington’s Leek (Allium ampeloprasum var.babingtonii) at the RHS Botanical Art Show 2018 (12 July 2018)

Mally Francis - a Timeline in Botanical Art
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She was a particularly lovely person and always very kind. I have known her for well over 30 years. She started botanical painting with me at the Leicester college and became a member of the LSBI. She also attended many of my Summer Schools at Market Overton. She then moved to Cornwall and started teaching but we kept in contact and I have always heard particularly flattering comments about her teaching. I am sure that all who had the privilege of knowing her will miss her
Anne-Marie Evans

The Studio was originally built about 250 years ago as the Sawpit for the Heligan estate when logs were dragged in by a horse and then cut into planks and beams by two men using a pit saw. One above, standing on the log (the top-dog) and the other below in the pit, covered in sweat and sawdust, (the under-dog).
When we bought The Wagon House in 1997 the Sawpit had become a ruin with only two cob walls standing and the brick piers opposite to support the roof.
In 1999 we commenced the restoration and it came into full use as our studio early in 2000. The Sawpit, thirty feet long and six feet deep still remains beneath the floor as a little piece of Heligan history. 
Nowadays, the Sawpit is in full time use again, either for the Botanical Painting classes or as a Photographic Studio. A collection of old saws are attached to the roof beams.

My teaching philosophy is to encourage all students to develop their own skills to the highest level possible. There is never any competition in my classes and everyone can work at their own pace. The courses are always enjoyable and old friends meet each other year after year as they return to continue their studies. Everyone has their own aspirations and it gives me great pleasure to help them to achieve their own goals.
Mally Francis (in Mally Francis Paints the Lost Gardens of Heligan
February 1, 2011 by Tania Marien)

a still from the video about her botanical painting classes at the Wagon House

The Florilegium was the inspiration of Mally Francis FCPGFS, FEPFS who founded the Society in 2000, and was its Chairman from 2001 to 2012. Mally stepped down in January 2012, and was made Honorary Founder Chairman of the Society, and a Fellow of The Linnean Society in recognition of her contributions to world of Botanical Illustration and Botany.
Eden Project Florilegium Society