The Celia Rosser Award was created to commemorate Celia’s significant international achievements as a botanical artist.

Celia is best known for her stunning illustration of ‘The Banksias’, a 3-volume monograph of the entire 76 species of the genus Banksia known at the time which is regarded as one of the most finest collections of botanical paintings in the world.

This Award reflects Celia’s achievements and is presented to exhibiting artists whose works show excellence in one or more aspects of the art form including the highest degree of scientific accuracy.

This year, we would like to congratulate the winners of this year’s Celia Rosser Award:

• Dianne Emery – Amanita muscaria   
• Joanne Knott – Banksia petiolaris

Dianne is a third time winner of the Celia Rosser Award which clearly demonstrates her exceptional talents as a botanical artist. 

Joanne Knott, is a first time award winner, but must feel an enormous sense of pride receiving this award from Celia for her painting of a Banksia. 

Additionally, Celia would also like to make Honourable Mention to the following artists:

• Haya Alketbi – Pyrus sp

Haya is a student of Dianne Emery’s online botanic art classes conducted via the Friends of the Gardens.  Haya is based in the United Arab Emirates and gets up at 4am each Friday to attend her online classes.

• Eunike Nugroho – ‘Graceful Garlic’

Eunike is from Indonesia.

• Jennifer Taranto – Solanum beaceum (Tamarillo) 

• Beverly Allen – Corymbia ficifolia cv cv 

             

Congratulations to all artists for this wonderful achievement.

To visit the TABI Exhibition, click here.

The Royal Botanic Gardens have selected six artworks for botanical art collection which is a component of the State Botanical Collection incorporating original artworks, manuscripts, archives and specimen collection.

Congratulations to the following artists:

• Amanda Blake-Sutterby Amyema lilnophylla
• Linda Lunnon Grevillea buxifolia
• Tess Mahar Hydrangea macrophylla
• Eunike Nugroho Paphiopedium fairrieanum (Fairries II)
• Francoise Piquet-Vadon Iris germanica (Indigo Princess)
• Lioudmila Volodina Vaccinium corybosum

These artworks have been purchased through donations from the Friends of the Royal Botanic Gardens Trust Fund and the RBGV’s Director’s Circle.

To visit the TABI Exhibition, click here.

Before the harrowing bushfires in Australia over our most recent summer, Jan Woodman captured a moment when an area of virgin bushland in the Adelaide Hills was flourishing.

Jan recalls, “It was the most wonderful and magical area abounding with wildflowers, orchids, ferns and fungi.”

Sundews and helmet and mosquito orchids were often the first to flower in this area and Jan loved to include them in her botanical paintings.

Jan was heartbroken when this conservation park was decimated by fire but has since returned to see ‘brave little sundews flowering’ but feels the bushland will never be the same.

Jan is one of many artists in ‘The Art of Botanical Illustration’ who reflect their local bushland in their art and following Australia’s 2019/20 Summer fires, this process is even more important to capture species which may be rare, threatened or endangered.

View ‘Early Wildflowers from Porter’s Scrub (before the fires)’ to enjoy Jan’s memory of this special place. 

To visit the TABI Exhibition, click here.

The 15th Art of Botanical Illustration 19 September – 31 December 2020

A Virtual Exhibition

This year the Friends will present the fifteenth biennial ‘The Art of Botanical Illustration’ Exhibition as a virtual exhibition. 

TABI as the exhibition is fondly known, will go ahead despite the uncertainty around restrictions due to COVID-19 because the Friends believe it is important to support the artists who loyally contribute to this exhibition. 

The exhibition is a sublime collection of some of the very best botanical illustration around the world and this year is represented by the ‘hero image’ of a Agapanthus Seed Head by Vicki Philipson, a long-term student of the Friends Botanical Art Program. 

Following the engagement of international artists in the Friends’ online botanical art classes during term 2, we hope to have greater contribution from international artists to further lift the profile of this popular exhibition.

Whilst we are unable to present this iconic exhibition in Domain House, TABI, one of Australia’s most prestigious botanical art exhibitions, will still be delivered at our normal highly professional standard in an online framework. A selection process will still take place and the prestigious Celia Rosser Award for Excellence will be awarded as usual. To be selected, the artist merit and scientific accuracy of the art work will be assessed.  

A benefit of the online presentation of TABI, is our ability to extend the duration of the exhibition with artwork displayed from 19 September – 31 December, making it also a perfect event for online Christmas shopping. 

We hope you will join us to support The Art of Botanical Illustration later this year. 

Applications for Artists

Applications for The Art of Botanical Illustration 2020 are now open. The closing date for entry and online submission of artwork is 9 August 2020 at 11.59pm. Artists must complete both the entry form and upload their high-resolution artwork to DropBox to complete the application in full. 

Artists can download the ‘Information for Artists’ which includes both the ‘conditions of entry’ and the ‘FAQ’s’ by visiting the exhibition page.  The link to the online entry form is also available on the Friends’ website.

The ‘Conditions of Entry’ includes several changes, due to the online delivery of the exhibition, therefore we suggest artists read the conditions of entry carefully. 

The selection of artwork based on the criteria outlined in the ‘Conditions of Entry’ will take place in August and successful artists will be notified on 1 September 2020 via email. 

Key Dates for Artists

9 August, 11.59pm                    Deadline for entry forms and images to be submitted

17 – 31 August                          Selection panel deliberates 

1 September                             Artists informed by email of results of selection process

19 Sep – 31 December               Exhibition live online

Launching our New Website and Membership Program

If you are reading your botanic news, you will have visited the Friends new website. It is modern, easy to read and navigate and we hope you love it. 

The new website came out of necessity to improve the user experience when booking events, renewing your membership, finding details about the next art exhibition or art classes, the opening hours of Plant Craft Cottage or our latest news. 

We are hope now you can find anything you could possibly want to know about the Friends and are able to book events and renew your membership easily. 

Coinciding with a new website, is the launch of our new membership program, TidyHQ. 

The use of TidyHQ was also born out of necessity to improve the user experience for our members and the staff and office volunteers who manage your memberships and event bookings. 

Using TidyHQ has several benefits for the Friends, including time and cost savings and as ‘Tidy’ is a Melbourne based company, support is local which is important when things aren’t quite working the way they should…not that we are expecting any issues. 

From now, all memberships will be processed via TidyHQ. Renewal letters will be automatically sent to you without staff or office volunteers doing anything. This, together with many other fabulous features will provide significant time savings for the office allowing us to concentrate on delivering other wonderful programs and initiatives for you. 

We hope you will take some time after you have read you Botanic News, to explore the website site and next time you need to renew your membership, we hope you will enjoy the simplicity of TidyHQ. 

Georgina and Jill

The Friends Office