STORY BEHIND THE ART OF GAYE GROSSMAN
22nd Annual International
American Society of Botanical Artists at Marin Art & Garden Center
Harlequin Mix Morning Glory
Ipomoea purpurea cvs.
About two years ago I started thinking about which final subject to tackle for my certificate in botanical illustration at New York Botanical Garden. I have always loved vining plants, which may have started around my eighth birthday when my mother gave me a hand-painted desk covered in morning glories. I spent countless hours drawing those blossoms and curling vines and leaves. I still have that desk and what strikes me now is how delightfully spontaneous and free spirited they appear. Part of this comes from the stylized nature of the artist’s rendering and I thought it would be an interesting challenge to try to maintain that feeling in the more representational manner used in botanical art.
I planted at least half a dozen different kinds of morning glory seeds in my back yard and as the summer progressed I also kept checking in with the options growing at NYBG and Wave Hill in the Bronx. Wave Hill provided some stiff competition with a beautiful and huge Moon Flower, which I did use in a different painting. But it was one of my own plantings, Harlequin Mix, Ipomoea purpurea, which I decided would be the best focus for this piece. The patterning and color range on the blossoms is wonderful. Some of them appear to have their colors thrown across the surface in random striations ranging from deep purple to magenta to a soft blue. There were also some almost pure white flowers with just a hint of pink in the throat.
The real deciding factor for me, however, was the leaves. Most morning glory leaves are cordate, shaped like a heart, and others are hastate, shaped more like a spear with flaring lobes at the base. The leaves of this Harlequin Mix morning glory are a variation of both. They look like pointed, twisting and undulating ribbons or like flat hearts with ruffled edges. They are also thicker and stiffer than typical leaves in this species. The veins seemed to follow no rules, coming together and spreading apart at random. I thought they were fascinating and I just had to paint them.
I painted this composition in watercolor, mostly using a dry brush. I thought this method lent itself well to capturing the unusual details of this plant while at the same time conveying a sense of gentle but steady movement. I painted from life as much as possible and was amazed by the degree of change almost from minute to minute. Nothing stayed still or remained the same for very long. This piece is part of a larger, ongoing project I have planned to cover a wide variety of morning glories.
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