Gustavo Surlo wins First Prize in Margaret Flockton Award 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:

1. Accurate interpretation and portrayal of the plant characters and diagnostic features highlighted in the botanical description
2. Technical merit
3. Artistic merit
4. Composition
5.  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)

Phoenix canariensis (Canary Island date palm) by Juan Luis Castillo (Spain)

Another highly accomplished digital illustration captures the complex structure of the Phoenix palm with delicate simplicity. The large frond, embellished with linear tone, is full of movement and life, a challenge with such a large, flat subject.

With the use of delicate line and continuous tone, Juan has also created a clear rendering of a complex habit, without the lines blocking in or dropping out on reduction. Variation in line weight creates interest and effectively assists in describing form.

​The judges could not fault the composition, with its balanced arrangement, using the element’s strong shapes to easily direct the eye around the plate

​ABOUT JUAN LUIS CASTILLO

​Juan Luis Castillo is a biologist by training but is now a professional scientific botanical illustrator illustrating scientific publications (more than 60 articles and more than 20 books). Notably he has contributed very many scientific botanical illustrations for the Flora Iberica project developed by the Royal Botanical Garden, Madrid.  He was also the first Western illustrator to contribute to the Flora of China.
Other awards are:

• 2001: RHS awarded him a Gold Medal for his botanical illustration of Genus Sorbus in the Iberian Peninsula
• 2001: the Linnean Society awarded him to the Jill Smythies Award for excellence in scientific botanical illustration
• 2007: He also achieved second prize in the Margaret Flockton Award 
• 2016, 2017 and 2018: Highly Commended in the Margaret Flockton Award 

The media he uses for botanical illustration include, Chinese ink, watercolour or gouache and latterly digital illustration. He is a past member of both SBA and ASBA. His artwork is in a number of different collections.

You can find him online at:

• website: http://www.juanluiscastillo.com/index.html (which is in both Spanish and English)
• scientific papers

Highly Commended

The two artists who were highly commended for their botanical illustrations were:​​

• Nepenthes macfarlanei (MacFarlane pitcher plant) by Francois Sockhom Mey (France)
• Prunus persica var. persica (peach) by Laura Ribulgo (Argentina)

The links in the plant name are to the image in the Flickr Album.

This dynamic ink drawing effectively captures the pigmentation on the wonderfully 3-dimensional pitchers, whilst also balancing well with the delicate leaf venation and fine hairs and glands.  
This is another great example of using composition to create an interesting illustration that doesn’t confuse, but informs the viewer, by giving context to the complex and often abstract magnified structures. The judges were entertained by the subjects breaking out of their circular constraints, giving the drawing a bit more character.

Judges comment on Nepenthes macfarlane

This beautifully executed graphite rendering captured the judges. Although created in a medium notorious for dropping-out in reproduction, Laura’s technique has enough strength and clarity to print well and clearly communicate even the finest plant structures. An excellent example of soft and subtle tonal work combines with clear outlines and just enough contrast in detailed areas to avoid confusion. The simple layout works well, allowing each element to stand on its own, without complicated layering.

Judges comment on Prunus persica var. persica by Laura Ribulgo

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The 20th Margaret Flockton Exhibition (2023)

The 20th Margaret Flockton Award celebrates scientific botanical illustrations that have been .

• In 2023, a total of 54 entries created by 37 artists from 18 different countries were judged - and ALL can be seen in the Flickr Album
• Of these, 29 finalists are being exhibited on-site at the Australian Botanic Garden Mount Annan until Friday 20 October 2023.
• You can also view the full exhibition on Flickr

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.

Entries selected for this exhibition 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.

The artists - including award winners and highly commended illustrators - are as follows.

[UPDATE: The listing has been amended since publication to include the names of all artists in the virtual exhibition. I'm awaiting the list of the 29 selected artists and will highlight these in the list when I've received it.]

ASIA

INDONESIA

• Diana Novitasari Trisna Dewi
• Reza Raihandhany (2 works)
• Guy Frankin Sitorus
• Saniyatun Mar'atus Solihah
• Novita Sary (2 works)

• Tiprada Tingkluab

QATAR

• Sandunmali Kulasekara

SINGAPORE

• Evonne Tay-Koh (2 works)
• Loh Xiang Yun

THAILAND

• Novita Sary (2 works)
• Tiprada Tingkluab

VIETNAM

• Thanh Nha Phan-thi (2 works)

AUSTRALASIA

AUSTRALIA

• Andrew Carr
• Maura Chamberlain
• Linda Lunnon
• Sarah Millar
• Alastair Robinson
• Dian Westerhuis

EUROPE

BULGARIA

• Dina Rogatnykh (2 works)

GREECE​

• Hans de Vries

ITALY

• Eleonora Longo
• Donatella Marchetti
• Mariapia Pasini

PORTUGAL 

• Andreia d’Almeida

ROMANIA

• Ivona Maris

SPAIN ​

• Segio Hernandez Bello
• Juan Luis Castillo (2ND PRIZE 2 works)

TURKEY

• Canan Atay
• Melike Cigdem

LATIN AMERICA

ARGENTINA 

• ​María Alejandra Migoya (2 works)
• Laura Ribulgo

BRAZIL

• Joelcio Freitas (2 works)
• Maria Alice de Rezende (2 works)
• Natanael Nascimento dos Santos
• Susana De Souza (2 works)
• Gustavo Surlo (1ST PRIZE / 2 works)

COLOMBIA

• Benjamin Cardenas (2 works)
• Juan Pablo Vergara G

MEXICO

• Yocelin Hernandez