NEWS about Botanical Art and for Botanical Artists

ABBA: Call for Entries for 'Purely Botanical'

23/6/2020

The Association of British Botanical Artists (ABBA) have announced their Call for Entries for their next botanical art exhibition called "Purely Botanical" - and it opens for submissions today. (I was alerted to this by ABBA after publishing my last post - and they very kindly sent me the details this morning!)

As an Association of Botanical Artists our focus is on reflecting accurately the natural beauty of plants that surround us, particularly native plants.

Purely Botanical - Call for Entries

This call for entries is a bit different

This is NOT an Open Exhibition. The exhibition is only open to those who are members of the Association of British Botanical Artists. However see my note about membership below.
This is a virtual exhibition - NOT an exhibition "in a place".
This is NOT a juried exhibition - except insofar as making sure all entries relate to "botanical art"

That said, the Gallery software and presentation of their last exhibition "Winter Warmer (2019)" is excellent. I really like the way that it:

provides permanent online exhibition space on the website - with hanging space for any size of picture
each image is listed WITH an artwork title, the name of the artist and a description
it's really easy to move from one artwork to the next - in the "slideshow" format
right click is disabled - meaning images cannot be downloaded
the preamble lists all the artists and where they come from PLUS a map showing where artists live. The last exhibition included artists living across the world.
the images are excellent - and upsize to a reasonable if clicked - at which point you also access a more detailed description of the artwork
it remains online until the next online exhibition.

Entry Criteria

Who can enter:

Only Members of ABBA can submit artwork. However despite the name the website makes clear that ABBA is ....

ABBA is for every one - every where - every ability

the membership fee has been reduced significantly in the current context to £25p.a. (for which I applaud ABBA!) See the membership page for more details.

What artwork can be entered:

botanical art (I'd like to see a link to a more precise definition of "botanical art" on the ABBA website)
their preference is for plants native to your location (which makes them a bit different to other art societies who allow international entries but prefer to stipulate that entries should be relevant to the location of the organisation)
Either an existing artwork or a new piece.
The exhibition is not juried other than ensuring the work is "botanical art".
A maximum of two pieces of artwork can be submitted - of which at least one will be exhibited.

Key dates: The key dates are:

Open for Submissions: 23rd June 2020
Closing Date for Submissions: 20th September 2020
Exhibition Opens: 4th October 2020

How to submit: This is the Artwork Submission Page. You need to submit the following details plus a digital image

Title
Description
Scientific name(s) if possible
Size of your image (inside mount measure - width and height in cm)
Scale - if other than life size (i.e. 2x OR you have drawn a scale bar)
Your digital image - of "publishable quality". The technical requirements for the image to display optimally are:
- scanned ( professionally preferred) or a quality photograph
- minimum resolution of 72 dpi
- a minimum of 2500 pixels on the shortest side
- format can be .tiff or .jpg (100% or Max) .png
- a maximum file size of 10MB

An "Original" Concern
I'd recommend that ABBA always stipulate that all artists confirm that...

artwork submitted is wholly ORIGINAL (i.e. not copied in whole or part)
the sole work of the artist (i.e. not created in a class taught by another artist or done as part of an exercise in a book)
any reference photos used by the artist are also their own (i.e. taken by the artist not paid for by the artist)

It helps to avoid the wholly avoidable and potentially expensive complications with third parties - for both ABBA (as publishers) and the artist - if somebody asserts that an artwork displayed in an exhibition has infringed their copyright. It's now very much a standard requirement for most art competition and open exhibitions - precisely because this problem has occurred (again and again) in the past. I've personally known of a number of examples told to me by various art societies and/or the artists who have had their copyright infringed over 15 years of writing online about open exhibitions. I've also reported infringements to art societies! (I see and know a LOT of artwork!)

A stipulation by the organisers that all work MUST be completely original - plus an immediate takedown when notified with adequate proof - almost always performs the "get out of jail free card" function for the organisation concerned. (Not so for the artist though)

However the stipulation very often avoids the really awful experience for an art society of being notified that somebody has been very naughty - and it's there for all to see!

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SBA's VIRTUAL Online Annual Exhibition opens

3/6/2020

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The Society of Botanical Artists's Annual Exhibition - Plantae 2020 - is now ONLINE and open for viewing. I think this virtual exhibition is probably the biggest ever exhibition of botanical artwork ever!

I'll be doing

a post about the selected artists tomorrow and
a review of the exhibition on Friday - by which time I'll have viewed all the images.

Plantae 2020 comprises 426 artworks - paintings, drawings, fine art prints, and 3D work - by 221 artists. Content is very varied as always with previous SBA Exhibitions. (You can find my blog posts about previous SBA exhibitions on this page). I think it's a terrific achievement by both artists and the SBA Officers - everything works really well and I love the alternative ways of viewing the exhibition!

The Online Exhibition comprises the images submitted for the selection process. As such they were never intended for an online exhibition and we need to appreciate that not everybody is the best digital image-maker - but that doesn't mean to say they are not a good botanical artist.

Here's how to view the images ONLINE in one of the three ways you can choose to view.

If you View by Artwork - it starts a slideshow of all the 426 images in the exhibiton (+ music!)

This is Rosa 'Comte de Champagne' by Janie Pirie which was selected as the featured artwork for Plantae 2020.

If you View by Thumbnails - you can choose which artwork you want to look at. There are 11 pages of thumbnails on my screen. This is what one page of thumbnails looks like.

If you View by Artist - you can see all the entries by one artist.
Below is a great set of paintings by Julia Asenbaum from Scotland.

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Art is for sale

You can enquire if artwork is for sale.

If it is then you purchase direct from the artist - and all transactions should comply with all relevant ecommerce / online / distance selling law and regulations in the UK (the link is to my page on this topic)
SBA passes on the enquiry to the artist but is taking no commission on sales - which means this benefits the artist more than usual in these challenging times.

I'd have liked to see an online catalogue or basic price list on the website for the exhibition. The practical reason for this is that, for the most part, I find that no price means people don't ask whereas a price in an exhibition seems to start to stimulate the buying urges and the queries start!

DON'T FORGET - more about the exhibition tomorrow and Friday
- but you can start viewing Plantae 2020 right now
You can subscribe to this blog if you want my blog post delivered to your inbox (see above)

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Drawn from Nature: Irish Botanical Art - Online and Reopening

30/5/2020

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Some good news for those who thought they might miss Drawn from Nature: Irish Botanical Art at the National Gallery of Ireland - which features botanical art in Ireland spanning almost 300 years, from the 1720s to 2019.

Back in March I wrote about the opening of this new exhibition of botanical art (see link to blog post above). As luck would have it, it had hardly been open any time at all when the Pandemic started and all art galleries - and exhibition were closed around the world.

The GOOD NEWS is that:

Drawn from Nature: Irish Botanical Art will reopen on 20 July. The exhibition will then continue until 30 August 2020.
In the meantime, you can view Drawn from Nature Online - an online exhibition of a selection of watercolours, drawings and illustrations from the exhibition. This includes sections on
- Botanical Illustration
- The Botanical Portraitist
- plus a selection of artwork by Contemporary Botanical Artists on this link

Drawn from Nature celebrates three centuries of Irish botanical art. The exhibition includes drawings, watercolours, prints, and illustrated publications dating from the 1700s to the modern day. ....

While some of these artists ventured far across the world, others barely travelled beyond their townlands. Many were celebrated during their lifetimes; others (mainly women) worked diligently, anonymously, and with little recognition. In their work, art and science become one.

The Botanical Portraitist

The artworks depict a wide variety of plants - common and rare; native to Ireland and exotic; growing wild and carefully cultivated. Included are Botanical Portraits, Illustrated Flora, and the work of Botanical Illustrators. The exhibition also features work by ten contemporary artists who follow in this rich artistic tradition and forge the way ahead.

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SBA Annual Exhibition to go online - from 3rd June

27/5/2020

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Plantae 2020 - annual exhibition of the Society of Botanical Artists

Good News! The Society of Botanical Artists announced today that ALL the artwork selected for Plantae Annual Exhibition 2020 will now be available to view in a NEW ONLINE EXHIBITION.

The original Annual Exhibition had been due to open at the Mall Galleries on 3rd June 2020. However on 19th March, the SBA were informed by the Mall Galleries that they would be closed with immediate effect - with no date for reopening in sight.

Instead Plantae will now go online on exhibition will open on 3rd June 2020 - and the exhibition will remain online until the end of June.

Hence it will be capable of being viewed - for the very first time - by anybody interested in botanical art living anywhere in the world!

Given the number of selected artworks in the show this is no small achievement - indeed I think it may well be the biggest online exhibition I'll have seen since lockdown started!!

Maybe online exhibitions will become the norm for all botanical art societies going forward? The Pandemic has certainly already changed a lot in terms of what we think of as normal going forward. At the very least, I think it's very appropriate that the oldest botanical art society in the world should be the first botanical art society to host a very large exhibition of botanical art available online.

To get some sense of what has been achieved -

Last year there were 431 artworks by c.190 botanical artists.
If you take a look at my review of last year's exhibition Review: Society of Botanical Artists 2019 - Plantae - you can see a sample of the number and standard of of artwork on view in the exhibition in my photos.

Announcement of new ONLINE exhibition opening 3rd June 2020 (Cherry Blossom painting by Billy Showell PSBA)

I'm not entirely clear about what which website the exhibition is going on or what the URL for the online exhibition will be. That will of course be announced by the SBA nearer to the time the online exhibition opens.

Sale of artwork

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