If you’re as excited about botanical art as I am, then you’re going to want to head to the York Botanic Art Prize asap!
The exhibit celebrates Western Australian wildflowers and is being put on by the York Branch of the Wildflower Society of Western Australia and Gallery 152 in York. As the gallery put it: ”Western Australia is renowned worldwide for its incredible diversity of plant life, with some of the richest biodiversity on the planet. Many are endemic to this land. The York Botanic Art Prize aims to celebrate this abundance of unique flora and highlight the importance of its conservation.”
So, early last week, I headed out to York with a few of my painting-class pals (as seen in the reflection of the window of the gallery’s café above!) and we explored the exhibit as well as the beautiful town of York. I wanted to share my experience and just a few of my favourite artworks - I’ve linked to some of the artist’s posts on Instagram below, but you can click here for a full list of featured artist’s and follow the Gallery 152 Instagram for updates on the winners and future exhibits!
Western Australian plants are really beautiful, with all their amazing colours, varied textures, unique shapes and unusual forms. I always try to use as many senses as possible when it comes to experiencing plants - seeing, smelling, hearing, touching. Of course, when it comes to art galleries, you usually are not encouraged to touch! But that doesn’t mean the texture can’t still come through visually. For me, this was really brought to life by the 3D abstract Banksia menziesii by Sarah Thornton-Smith titled “Cusp”, with the colourful follicles jumping out from the paper.
Then there was the beautiful oil on linen piece by Jane Coffey titled “Banksia menziesii, marked, section C”, which featured wonderful light and colour, and pink flagging tape to emphasise the links between people and plants. To me, this piece really highlighted the importance of our collective and ongoing efforts to better understand and conserve WA’s precious Banksia woodlands.
For more Proteaceae goodness, one corner of the gallery featured three Hakea artworks: a digital art print of a Hakea petiolaris person tapping away on a keyboard by Luke Barlow titled “Hacker Petiolaris” (love the pun) as well as two beautiful oil paintings of Hakea laurina in vases by Marcia Hadlow (titled “Marching into WInter”) and Susan Morris (titled “Kojet”). I was especially drawn to Marcia Hadlow's work because the reflections in the vase of various bits & bobs reminded me of the dream-like art of Dixit (a beautiful, whimsical card game which I love!).
There was also a whole lot of Myrtaceae magic in the exhibit, including the stunningly colourful collection of eucalypts and other related beauties in watercolour and ink by Jude Willis titled “Everything within its place”, the oil on linen “Ray of sunshine” piece featuring Eucalyptus rhodantha by Jen Mellor, and the intricately embroidered Eucalyptus macrocarpa artwork by Sujora Conrad titled “After North”.
And last but certainly not least (in fact, as a carnivorous plant researcher, you might even say it’s my favourite!), the awesome little Drosera squamosa sculptures by Laura Williams titled “Glisten”. And oh do they glisten! The glassy beads perfectly depicted the plant’s sticky dew drops, and the colour and texture of the watercolour and paper strips was so spot on to how these plants really look in the wild.
There were so so so many other amazing artworks and sculptures on display (more than fifty!) so, if you want to catch them all in one place, definitely go on to Gallery 152 before the exhibit closes on January 24! There’s a lot to see around York as well, including a lovely playground, a sock factory (last of its kind in WA!), a historic sweet shop, and beautiful natural surroundings. And if I’ve not convinced you, you might like to read another blog post by the lovely Angela from Studio Nikulinsky, which inspired me to get over to York for the exhibit in the first place 😊