Beauty and Bounty

(please, click the image to enlarge)

Only Five more Days Left for the Student and Instructor Show

(Image by Nance Minnick, 2009-graduate)

If you have not yet seen the Botanical Art and Illustration Student show in the Gates Garden Court please visit and enjoy. These 67 exceptional works are on display only for five more days.


The instructor show in El Pomar gallery will also be taken down on November 9th. (Image: Cecropia palmata by Constance Sayas)

Artists, please pick up your work on November 9th from the Exhibitions and Art Collections Department during the business hours.

The Golden Age of Ornamental Penmanship in America

Golden Age of Ornamental Penmanship in America

by Dr. Joseph Vitolo

Friday, November 6th at Colorado College, Gates Common Room, Palmer Hall, 7 p.m.

(Reception to follow)

Dr. Joseph M. Vitolo is both a penmanship historian & a Calligrapher. He has spent extensive time and effort to rediscover and document the almost forgotten history and contributions of American Penmen/Calligraphers from ‘The Golden Age of Ornamental Penmanship’. Dr. Vitolo will explore this rich history as well as the remarkable men and women that contributed to it. In addition, a selection of remarkable original specimens dating from the late 1800’s to the early 1900’s will be available for viewing.

Dr. Vitolo is the owner/webmaster for both Zanerian.com, a site focusing on the history of this art form. An active member of The International Association of Master Penmen, Engrossers and Teachers of Handwriting (IAMPETH) he has published more than sixty articles on penmanship/script writing and lectures extensively around the country on topics ranging from science to dentistry to calligraphy. Dr. Vitolo is currently the director of both the Advanced Care Clinic and the Advanced Education in General Dentistry Residency program at Marquette University Dental School in Milwaukee, WI.
The talk is free and open for public, it is organized by Summit Scribes Calligraphy Guild.

(Botanical Art and Illustration Certificate Program annually offers classes in Calligraphy, please see the preliminary Winter Spring 2010 program.)

Botanica Magnifica in Denver!

(Victoria Amazonica photograhed by Jonathan Singer, Botanica Magnifica, 2009)

Botanica Magnifica features two hundred and fifty stunning photographs by Hasselblad Laureate Award winner Jonathan Singer.
The original edition of Botanica Magnifica was limited to ten copies, the first of which was donated to the Smithsonian Institution and is kept in the Cullman Rare Book Room at the Smithsonian Institution Libraries. The original volume is hand bound in goatskin, hand sown by Kerstin Tini Miura, German master bookbinder who now has ateliers both in California and Japan.

The extra-large “double-elephant” format of this first edition was chosen in honor to the famous double-elephant folio of The Birds of America by Audubon. The original is said to be worth $2.5 million.

The trade edition, baby-elephant folio of Botanica Magnifica was recently released by Abbeville Press. The volume is, like the original, organized into five alphabetically arranged sections. Each pictured plant is accompanied by a clear description of its botany, geography, folklore, history, and conservation. The species included are rare plants, historically significant flowers, gold medal winners, newly discovered plants, and plants that are just beautiful.

Dr. Singer, a podioatrist by profession, is photographing all his specimens with Hasselblad camera on black background, in low light and he only takes one single shot for each entry. Dr. Singer was named a Hasselblad Laureate Award winner (May 2008) based on his contribution to fine art photography and to “our perception and appreciation of the botanical world”.
The authors for the book are John Kress, the Curator of Botany and Research Scientist at the National Museum of Natural History at the Smithsonian Institution and Marc Hachadourian, the Acting Manager of the Nolen Greenhouses for the New York Botanical Garden.

Watch Jonathan Singer on CBS Sunday Morning News, click here.

Flowers Writ Large by Smithsonian Magazine, May 21, 2009

Denver Botanic Gardens is hosting a Botanica Magnifica presentation and book signing on November 7th, 10 a.m. – noon with Jonathan Singer and W. John Kress. The baby-elephant, presented in a collectors slipcase will sell at this event for pre-publication price of $135. The event is FREE for General Public. More detailed information, please click here.

Fibonacci in Cafe Botanique

The Nature of Fibonacci Numbers

By Richard Yeatts, Ph.D., Colorado School of Mines, Golden, CO

The sequence of numbers 1,1,2,3,5,8,13,..., wherein each number is the sum of the preceding two, is credited to Leonardo of Pisa (a.k.a. Fibonacci). The remarkable properties of these numbers and their progeny, the "golden" ratios, find application in nearly every field of human endeavor including art, music, economics, and geometry. In the life sciences, the numbers relate to such diverse subjects such as human anatomy, snail shells and the architecture of plants.

F. R. (Dick) Yeatts is a Professor Emeritus in Physics at the Colorado School of Mines. While employed, his research was mostly in geophysics. Since retiring, his interest is in mathematics and physics of plants.

Café Botanique is a part of the Botanical Art and Illustration Program and is open to everybody. The 30-40 minute talk starts at 6:30 p.m. and is followed by a discussion. Café Botanique meets every first and third Thursday of the month, each time with a different topic relating to Denver Botanic Gardens exhibits and Botanical Illustration classes. There is no admission fee and pre-registration is not required. This lecture offers one elective credit hour in the BI-program.

CAFÉ BOTANIQUE
Thursday, November 5, 2009
Denver Botanic Gardens – Morrison Center
6:30 – 8 p.m.

If you are in London go North

(photo: MHjK)

If you are in London, please visit the Kew Gardens. The Marianne North Gallery reopened October 8th after an extensive renovation. Marianne North Gallery is one of Britain’s most important galleries for botanical art containing 832 paintings produced by Marianne North during 13 years of travel around the world. Her painting style was quite unique: after a rough sketch with pen and ink she applied the pigment squeezed directly from the tubes. Apart from the gallery building itself also many of North’s paintings have been restored.

You can access the digital gallery of the 832 paintings here.

(Photo: MHjK)

SNOW HOTLINE 720-865-3620!

(DBG's conservatory February 3, 2007, photo: MHjK)

We are expecting our first major snow-event tonight, please call 720-865-3620 for the status of current classes at the Gardens.

Interesting Teaching Tools

(Maple Fan by Karla Beatty)

During the portfolio sharing at the recent ASBA meeting in Phoenix this Maple Fan was a source of interest and discussion.

Few of us had realized how easily we can create intriguing teaching tools. Having a Maple Fan as a value finder is certaily much more fun than the traditional boxes:

Carolyn Crawford presents

Milkweeds Native to Colorado and Adjacent Areas
at Quintuple Day, the annual fall symposium for Rocky Mountain Chapter of the North American Rock Garden Society
When: October 24, 10:30 – 11:30 p.m.
Where: Denver Botanic gardens, Gates Hall

Carolyn Crawford has managed to find, photograph, and illustrate all the native milkweeds of Colorado, plus a number of others from the West. Carolyn has illustrated the original descriptions of two new species of milkweed native to Mexico, described by Mark Fishbein and Mark Fishbein & Steve Lynch, and contributed the treatment for the milkweed family for the San Juan Basin Flora.
For the detailed Quintuple Day Program, please click here.

(Image: Cosmos by Carolyn Crawford)

Evolutionary Play in Cafe Botanique

An Evolutionary Play in the Ecological Theatre:Influences of Landscape and Climate Change on the Clan of the Parry primrose

By Tass Kelso, PhD, Colorado Collage, Colorado Springs, CO

The Parry primrose clan encompasses a group of species endemic to western North America from Colorado to Idaho and south into the Sierra Madre of Mexico. This talk will examine the diverse genetic and ecological perspectives we now have on the group, and how these support models of speciation on different time and geographic scales. Paleoecological, landscape and climate data show changes in the Rocky Mountain/Great Basin region since the Cretaceous that probably enhanced speciation through separation of populations on increasingly isolated alpine habitats. However, regional climatic and vegetation models for the future indicate that concerns about habitat loss, diminishing populations, and poor reproduction are warranted for many members of the clan.
Tass Kelso is a professor of biology at Colorado College, where she has been teaching botany since 1987. Her research specialties are the evolution, diversity and biogeography of the western flora, especially the Primulaceae.

CAFÉ BOTANIQUE
Thursday, October 22, 2009
Denver Botanic Gardens – GATES HALL

6:30 – 8 p.m.