Summer/Fall 2013 Catalog of courses is out!

You can view our upcoming course offerings by clicking the image above or on the side panel. You can download the pdf  here (scroll down where you see: Download the printable 2013 Summer/Fall Botanical Illustration Course catalog) .
NOTE: The flipbook version opens in a new window but requires Flash. That is the reason why you can’t see the image of the book on an iPad or iPhone, or most other mobile devices. Scroll down the page if you are on a mobile device to see that there is more info. The "Click to launch the full edition in a new window” does work on an iPhone so you can get to the YUDU book if you scroll through the white area. 
Registration opens on July 11, 9 a.m. and until then the classes on our registration site appears as if they were sold out.
This catalog includes all our offerings: offerings onsite at Denver Botanic Gardens, Off-site (Yampa River Botanic Park in Steamboat Springs and El Charco del Ingenio Botanical Gardens in San Miguel de Allende, GTO, Mexico)

Happy Sjuttende May for our Norwegian readers

(Emerson Easley, watercolor pencil and ink - please click the image to enlarge)

I like to wish Happy 17 May for our Norwegian readers with this delicate watercolor pencil illustration by Emerson Easley - the most recent addition to our Chronicles

Heaven on Earth -

(please click the image to enlarge)

Perfect Mother's Day Gift - Mrs. Delaney and her Circles

 Mrs Delaney started her life's work at seventy-two and by the time she turned 88 and started loosing her eyesight she had created over 1000 images, all cut with filigree-handled scissors from scarlet paper, carefully colored and then mounted on black background. They are accurate representations of the flowers and most of them are now kept in British Museums collections.

Come and join our weekend workshop on Mrs. Delaney and her circles - a perfect mother's day gift and you can visit Denver Botanic Gardens Annual Plant Sale at the same time.   

  Before devoting her life for paper-cutting, which Mrs. Delaney is most known for, she was a skilled embroiderer and her works can be viewed e.g., at the Royal School of Needlework (above a court dress detail, silk embroidery on satin, 1740-41).

Practical Botanicals, Pen and Ink and Much More

(Fabric design by Christine Hubbell)

Please see more images form our April courses by clicking here.

(Illumination by Angela Tingle)

Our New 3-fold Information Brochure

 

Download our new brochure (click the image) or visit Denver Botanic Gardens to get your hard copy.

Master Painter and Master Craftsman

 Jenny Phillips demonstrating for 13 students who are participating in our first of the 15-hour workshops that Jenny is teaching at Denver Botanic Gardens. Jenny Phillips established the Botanical Art School in Melbourne, Australia in 1992, visited Denver Botanic Gardens for the first time as visiting instructor in the mid-1990's when Angela Overy was the coordinator for the Botanical Illustrators here in Denver


We also have received a limited number of specially designed knives for quill cutting. These knives combine new technological processes with traditional skills. They are handmade by Master Blacksmith Hannu Antila in Finland. The 3.5 cm long blade has one side curved to make a better shape for cutting the quill. The handle is made of Finnish birch burl, which is stronger than the birch hardwood . The handle has a metal insertion to change the balance slightly, so if the knife is dropped it always falls on its handle protecting the blade. The sheath is handmade of reindeer skin.

For more images please click here.

School of Botanical Art and Illustration at Denver Botanic Gardens gets its own LOGO

Designed by Randy Raak - 

Mylar® – Dura-Lar™

 (Ink on Mylar® by Lynn Zoller, click the image to enlarge)

Both Mylar® – Dura-Lar™ are used in our School for a variety of media: colored pencils, pen and ink (technical pen and quill), ink washes and polycarbonate pencil (plastic pencil). Both products are polyester films. Mylar is one of the brand names for stretched polyethylene terephthalate (PET).  The true Mylar® is a registered trademark owned by DuPont Tejin Films. Since Mylar® polyester film was invented in the early 1950s, it has been used in a variety of applications that add value to products in virtually all segments of the world. Its excellent balance of properties and extraordinary range of performance capabilities make Mylar® ideal for a broad array of applications in the electrical, electronics, magnetic media, industrial specialty, imaging and graphics, and packaging markets (cooking bags are also mylar).Mylar® is available in a variety of finishes and gauges. We typically use double frosted Mylar® for colored pencil, ink and plastic pencil, we like the 5 mil thickness best.

(colored pencil on Mylar®, Susan Rubin, click the image to enlarge)

What is then GrafixDura-Lar™?  According to Grafix, Grafix Dura-Lar® is student grade Mylar®  The double frosted Dura-Lar comes only in the thickness of 5 mil, the other thicknesses of this film are single frosted. Grafix Dura-Lar® has smoother surface and can be used ideally for pen and ink and also for plastic pencil (which does not smear). This film does not wear the point of the technical pen as easily as mylar.

Both Mylar® and Grafix Dura-Lar® are archival and they are non-yellowing and water resistant (as is the polycarbonate pencil).

(polycarbonate pencil on Grafix Dura-Lar®, click the image to enlarge)

Grafito y Color

(Maple leaf study by Karla Beatty)

Our first class was held today in the quirky round classroom at El Charco. There were fourteen eager and appreciative students. A full house! It is a strong mix of English and Spanish language, and I'm so sorry to say that students must put up with the way I butcher the Spanish language. But we approach it all with humor and good spirits and that will get you through anything, verdad? 

We began our first class of the week with an approach based on leaves and foliage. I asked El Charco for a few samples of some of the local shrubs or small trees--mesquite and acacia--and one of the workers came into the class with a few big branches pruned from the shrubs! Full of thorns, too, ouch!

New students are ALWAYS so appreciative of the way that we teach drawing with pencils. They say that despite the art classes they may have had earlier, no one had ever taught them how to hold pencils, make marks on the paper, and create the kind of shading or toning the way that we teach at DBG. Whoo hooo! They are excited and eager to learn.

Although I understand you are having some more wintry weather there in Denver it is very hot here in Mexico. But the evenings and mornings are cool so it remains very pleasant. Of course I am so excited to be out and about the town that I am walking about in the heat, anyway. You know what they say, "Mad dogs and Englishmen....." Maybe the wrong country, the wrong continent, even, but I think it still applies! 

Hasta Manana,

Karrrrrla   (roll those rrrrrs)