Endangered Plants Index Degree Project

Michael Landy is a British artist, probably most famous for his artwork Break Down (2001), where he destroyed everything he owned. However, I am most interested in the series of works that Landy created after the fact, called Nourishment (2002). These works are a collection of life-sized etching prints made of the weeds that Landy saw and collected as he journeyed around London (Taylor, 2003). To me, the most fascinating elements (and the elements that I am going to investigate and explore here) are the prints themselves and the level of detail which Landy has achieved in them.

Creeping Buttercup (Landy, 2002):

This is the etching Creeping Buttercup (2002), in which Landy has very carefully represented the entirety of the buttercup plant. Although very clearly an etching, the print is not unlike other botanical illustrations I have studied, where he has used simple line drawing and shading techniques to create a detailed outline of the plant. Additionally, this print (like all of Landy’s in this series) is placed in the centre of a white page, isolating it in the centre and allowing the eye to be drawn entirely to the subject and not become distracted by any other features. This is something that I aim to achieve in my own works; creating my illustrations on plain white pages highlights the detail of the plant and again emphasises its importance.

Landy has carried the theme of importance carefully throughout this series, and raised it to the prominent position of being one of the main themes (for me) – taking something so commonplace, and often ignored and looked down upon; transforming it into a beautiful artwork, which people will treasure and enjoy. It is possible that when Landy was making this work, he was consciously elevating the downtrodden, because of the life and position that he had placed himself in after Break Down (2001) – having destroyed all of his possessions, thus putting himself in a very similar position to the homeless who, like the weeds Landy drew, lived on the streets on London and were looked down upon. Irrespective of whether this was the impetus behind elevating these wonderful plants from their previous societal position, the illustrations certainly change the public opinion of them, as very few would be able to view the etchings and not feel moved and in awe of these little plants; their intricate network of roots, stems, leaves and flowers, which all work in absolute harmony to support the plant, but that are also hardy enough and adaptable enough to survive in such hostile and urbanised areas as London and other cities.

When looking at the work, it is very clear that Landy has studied these plants meticulously; capturing every little detail, every root, every fold and contour of the petals and leaves and the branching of the stems has been observed and recorded. As I mentioned previously, the technique (although a etching) that Landy has used when shading and outlining appears to be very similar to the ‘dotting’ technique that I use when illustrating herbarium specimens. Additionally, the composition of the plant also reflects this, as although there is an undeniable 3D structure to it, the shape of the plant appears to be flattened, in order for Landy to capture the entirety of the Buttercup. In spite of this similarity, the drawing feels very different to the ones that I have produced – it feels much less scientific and more emotional than botanical illustrations, which I think fits with the narrative and context of these illustrations – they undeniably have a much more emotional and subjective background and ‘life’ to them.

Shepherd’s Purse 2 (Landy, 2002):

As it is part of the same series, this etching is very similar to the previous, and has the same narrative and backstory. However, it is undeniable that this etching feels much more delicate than the previous, partly due to the structure and form of the plant itself, but also partly due to the depth and tone of the print. The depth of the blacks in this print are much less than those in Creeping Buttercup (2002), which automatically creates a suggestion of heightened fragility and ephemerality. This sense of fragility acts in the print’s favour however, enticing the viewers to look closer, and delve much deeper both into the art, and the narrative of the image. This is something that I am attempting to achieve with my own work – including great levels of detail, which then forces the viewer to not only look closer at the work itself, but also spend much longer looking at it, and therefore thinking about and the purpose of the work as well.

Update: 08/06/22: If only I had known about trace down paper when I was drawing this!! It would have made the whole process much easier and less drawn out than it ended up being, and I possibly would have been able to complete more drawings, rather than spending an inordinate amount of time on researching the sizes of the orchid, and then scaling it up (although I got the maths wrong, and ended up scaling it up by between 100-200 times, rather than 10-20…)

Over the past few weeks, I have been completing a drawing of the Montserrat Orchid, one of the plants off the endangered plant list.

For me, this was the most challenging plant to draw so far – because the reference image I was using was of a live specimen – meaning that it didn’t have any scale of reference for it (all of the herbarium specimens have a scale on the side, which allows you to see the actual size of each specimen – which has been important and useful for me when drawing them to scale). Therefore, I had to do some research (as I mentioned earlier in the blog), in order to discover the size of the plant. Unfortunately, according to the only source I could find, the flowers of the Montserrat Orchid are very small – each flower only being 2cm in size. As I knew I wouldn’t be able to capture the full detail of the flower at this size, nor did I have an image of the whole plant in flower from which to draw, I therefore decided to magnify the size of the image (in my drawing) by 100 times (I had meant to increase it by 10, but I unfortunately got my maths wrong), meaning that I could capture the detail of the flower.

My original idea had been to reference traditional botanical illustration in the composition of the drawing, and so I drew the flower in the bottom right of the page. I then began to draw the roots and stem of the plant above it on the left, at an angle. However, I was again having issues with the scale and sizing of the image (as I had no reference point), and the size of the roots were so small they were very difficult to draw. I therefore abandoned drawing them for the moment, and filled in the flower with colour, with the process shown below.

Coloured pencil is one of my favourite (if not my favourite) media to work in, as you can do so much with it, and it is so controllable. I have a lot of experience in using coloured pencil, although it was mainly in portraiture and in drawing objects that I had used it (see below), so it was an obvious choice for me, to want to try using it for my botanical illustrations.

I am extremely happy with the outcome. Although the drawing isn’t as ‘smooth’ as that achieved with watercolour, the coloured pencil allows for equal colour blending, resulting in a life-like illustration. My process of working with coloured pencils begins with creating a light base layer – in this case, a light layer of pale yellow, from which I can build up from. I then worked petal by petal around the flower, slowly building up the layers as I went along. I find it much easier and more effective to work this way, rather than building the layers up over the whole illustration in one go. I would much rather focus on a smaller area, as it provides a much greater sense of satisfaction and achievement when you complete it, and spurs you on to finish the next section.

I hadn’t drawn a coloured pencil drawing for a good few years before completing this one, so there was an element of the unknown about it. However, I am very glad that I did decide to work with them again, as it was an experience I very much enjoyed; I felt that I had complete control over what I was doing, and nothing had to be left to chance, which was something that had been happening in my previous illustrations, due to the media that I have been working in. Additionally, working in coloured pencil refers to the works of Hazel Wilks, another illustrator from Kew Gardens, who, unlike Lucy Smith, does use coloured pencil in her practice as a botanical illustrator.

As I have been planning and pushing ahead with both sides of the project (bust most relevant here, there rewilding side), I am in the process of setting up a crowdfunder for it, from which I will raise some of the funds to action my project. This has taken a lot of additional work, creating imagery and a video, writing texts for it, and further budgeting to include the resiling elements as well.

I am still in the process of setting it up, and I am currently trying to decide (based on my budget, which I need to review before going any further) how large my fund-raising goal should be, before I can make the page live.

The below image is a screenshots that I have taken of the preview of the page:

I am planning on finalising this today, so I will update this post as soon as it goes live.

The above screenshot shows the Endangered Plant Index instagram as it is at the moment. As you can see, I have built it up using a variety of posts, some asking people to sign my petition, others sharing facts and insights that people may not have known about the native British wildlife (specifically flora). I have been making these posts using a software called Canva, which allows me to create consistent posts, which have a well established theme (using the same colours and type-faces every time) and easily add in text and images of my choice. The ability to do all of this means that I am able to create a consistent and well established ‘brand’ for my project – using the repeated use of certain colours or type-faces, etc, become synonymous with my project and give it a visual identity of its own.

Creating the instagram also means that I am able to campaign online as well as in person – starting the actions that I will undertake in my project online. It helps to establish the project, and give me something to reference when inviting others to join my project and collaborate with me – as they will be able to see the work that I have already done, and where they might fit in with my work.

Additionally, I have already had offers of collaboration from my friends and fellow activists, via instagram. This us crucial as their platforms are much larger than my own (and especially that of the Endangered Plant Index), and their interaction with and collaboration with my project, visually on social media, will help grow it enormously, thus also raising awareness and traction for the project.

The first post I made for the instagram was a short video or Reel, sharing the fact that I had made the petition, and asking people to sign it. For this, I took much inspiration from the posts of other movements and organisations such as Paid to Pollute and Fridays for Future, who routinely use reels in order to gain wider audience for their actions and the work that they are creating (below are screenshots of their instagram accounts, which served as inspiration for the content that I create for the Endangered Plant Index account)

The reel has been quite successful, and I therefore plan to make more in the future. Although when I normally create reels, I use TikTok to do lipsync videos with a climate theme, this time I used Adobe Premiere, as I had a script that needed editing into a certain order, as well as adding in imagery and videos to support the points that I was making in the text. It also allowed me to caption the video, thus making it accessible to deaf audiences too.

Overall, I am really pleased with the instagram so far – it is definitely slow growing, but I am happy with what I have created, and I look forward to working on it more and progressing it alongside my project.

Image Sources:

Paid to Pollute. (2021) Paid to Pollute Instagram. Available at: https://www.instagram.com/paidtopollute/ (accessed: 30 December 2021)

Fridays For Future. (2021) Fridays For Future Instagram. Available at: https://www.instagram.com/fridaysforfuture/ (accessed: 30 December 2021)