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The Art of Botanical Illustration: From 1550 to 1990 by Lys de Bray,
Christopher Helm, pp 192, Pounds sterling 25

IN THIS age of sophisticated photography, a frequent question posed
is: ‘Why do botanical illustrators still exist?’ Lys de Bray answers this
clearly in The Art of Botanical Illustration. ‘The camera see all and all
is too much,’ she says. ‘The eye sees what it needs and can concentrate
the brain and the hand on this essential part of the plant. The eye can
see that a leaf, a stem, a petal, a bract is not characteristic and brain
and hand can correct the drawn image. In addition, the finished drawing
must be characteristic of the species and not an individual specimen. There
is no substitute for the skill and knowledge and the God-given talent of
the botanical artist.’

Through the ages the main role of the botanical artist remains unchanged:
to record varieties and new species. Pages of descriptive text do not impart
the same amount of information as our careful drawing, often enhanced by
enlargements and dissections. At each stage of the progression from early
woodcuts to steel engravings to modern methods of printing both line and
full colour, the ability to reproduce more precise detail is possible. We
can show minute characteristics more clearly.

With the advent of printing, the work of the illustrator reached a larger
audience; and many made their names as artists. Pierre-Joseph Redoute could
be called the first ‘commercial’ botanic artist by producing prints of popular
or attractive plants which he knew would sell, such as Anemone coronaria.

The past two years have seen a great revival in the popularity and interest
in botanical illustration and several excellent publications have appeared.
It is confusing, though, when two books share the same title. In 1950, Collins
published the scholarly and definitive work on the subject, The Art of Botanical
Illustration by Wilfred Blunt. My first thought on hearing the title of
de Bray’s book was that the long overdue reprinting of Blunt’s masterpiece
had materialised.

De Bray gives accounts of the lives and works of both well-known and
lesser-known artists. With such a wealth of material available she must
have found it difficult to decide which illustrations to include. Although
the eight plates of Alfred Parsons’s roses are all very beautiful, Ferdinand
Bauer, possibly the greatest botanical artist of all time, has to contend
with only one while his brother who worked at Kew has two plates.

Much is written of the woman’s role as botanical artist. We can visualise,
with great admiration, the long and tedious hours spent by Elizabeth Blackwell,
drawing, and later engraving, plants from the Chelsea Physic Garden for
A Curious Herbal. This remarkable and dedicated woman was able to pay off
her husband’s debts with the proceeds, so freeing him from prison.

The sub-headings of the chapters enlighten one on the founding of the
Royal Society, the development of Kew Gardens and the history of botanical
magazines from 1787 onwards. But surely, under the heading ‘Travellers and
Explorers’, others deserved mention besides the Tradescants? This book’s
sub-title ‘From 1550 to 1990’ is also confusing. The last chapter, ‘Modern
Botanical Painting, 1900 to the Present Day’ was a surprise, albeit a welcome
one. But ‘painting’ was an unfortunate word to use as the chapter features
John Nash’s forceful wood engravings and mentions, but does not illustrate,
Stella Ross-Craig’s Drawings of the British Plants. Here was the chance
to show that the majority of serious botanical illustration this century
consists of line drawings because of the relatively high cost of colour
printing. And it was lost. Fewer plates from The Temple of Flora and the
inclusion of some examples of contemporary line drawings would have made
this chapter more comprehensive. A thin line separates botanical illustration
and botanical art and I wonder, for many reasons, if the book’s title is
the best one.

Rosemary Wise is a botanical illustrator in the department of plant
sci ences at the University of Oxford.