STORY BEHIND THE ART OF MILLY ACHARYA
21st Annual International
American Society of Botanical Artists at Wave Hill
Bear’s Breeches
Acanthus spinosus
The genus name comes from akantha, Greek for prickly or thorny, as are the leaves and bracts of this imposing plant; spinosus refers to its rigid spines. The common name, Bear's britches or breeches, has conflicting explanations regarding its origins---but it suggests a much softer quality than the Latin binomial.
Legend has it that a nymph named Akantha rejected Apollo's advances and scratched his face to express her displeasure. He retaliated by transforming her into a prickly plant---one to be approached by all with extreme caution!
Another tale relates that the Greek sculptor Callimachus found an Acanthus plant growing through the weave of a votive basket left beside the grave of a young girl. The deeply jagged, glossy deep green foliage caught his fancy. Ever since both naturalistic as well as highly stylized versions of Acanthus leaves have adorned the capitals of Corinthian columns, temple friezes, Greek, Roman and Byzantine architecture, and have appeared in Gothic, Renaissance, Victorian and contemporary decorative arts.
The plant is native to the Mediterranean basin, where the greatest species differentiation is found. Its introduction to more northern European latitudes came millennia later, while its appearance in North American gardens dates from only the late nineteenth century.
The specimens used in this painting are from my neighbor's garden. I'd watched the plant establish claim to turf over a few years before it put forth an imposing spire, bedecked with blooms in purple and white. While the leaves are more familiar and celebrated, the flowers seem less so, although they display a wealth of complexity that only seems to increase with closer acquaintance! So I decided to focus on the buds, blooms and seed-pods and include only a very few leaves in my study. As we were at the tail end of summer there was just a single A. spinosus spire remaining, with flowers and buds still intact---the rest were going to seed in a hurry. The filigreed leaves and petals of the older plants were visually quite arresting, so “compositionally” it felt right to arrange a tryst between youth and age.
There is an obvious symmetry to the whorled arrangement of the flowers on the stalk---two on opposite sides of the stem, let's say north and south, then the next pair east and west, at approximately one inch intervals, tapering into a close, tight cluster of buds yet to open at the very top. As the petals dry out at the base of the stalk, you can discern the nascent seed-pod, a sturdy, slightly indented ovoid form that changes slowly from pale olive to rich glossy brown, retaining its pistil stretched forward.
I must confess I found the task of presenting the complex structure of the flower truly daunting. At first glance you'll see a structure consisting of two strikingly distinct segments---a stiff upper lip, intensely dark in color and a white lower one--- together forming a bilabiate corolla. But wait, there's more to see and more to tell.
The lower single tri-lobed corolla blushes faintly from pale pink and mauve venation that shows up when the light is right. Within its interior wall it houses four stamens, fused at the base and rather hard to see.
As for the dark and sturdy upper lip, it has a metallic sheen, reminiscent of verdigris, and is ribbed with conspicuous deep purple veins. Its appearance suggests an elongated hood or helmet, guarding the delicate pale foam over which it stays suspended. Tweezers and magnifiers at the ready, I spent more time and effort in peeking and probing, both in and out, from above and below, to understand form and structure, before I could begin to paint the bilabiate corolla.
And then there are the three surrounding bracts, two minor ones on either side of the flower and one central structure beneath the white lower lip. This is the one to watch out for---it is fierce, all points and prickles, battle-ready, not unlike Akantha who scratched Apollo's handsome face!
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Read more about this artist’s work: America's Flora