VISIONS OF NATURE

Where are we on a frigid Superbowl Sunday?
Need another clue?

Gardening New Yorkers will immediately recognize the Brooklyn Botanic Garden.
We're at the Steinhardt Conservatory Gallery for the opening reception of the show "Visions of Nature". It's the annual showcase for adult students and instructors of the popular art classes at the BBG.
After  years of teaching gardening classes there, I led my first art workshop this fall, in conjunction with the publication of my new book, Artful Collage from Found Objects. Two of my students entered works in the show, as did I, their Garden Memories in Collage.

Above, Season Transition by Laura V. Osorio, collage with papers, bark, pressed plant materials.

 Above, Light in the Forest  and detail by Gail R. Levine, collage with papers, bark, cones, pressed plant materials.

Above, Greening the Westside Rooftops by Ellen Spector Platt, photo collage with found papers and netting, mixed media. I'm always trying to add roofgardens to the city, one way or another.

Also much admired was PD Packard's Wild Black Eyed Susan, ink and watercolor on Kozo Paper, from the Chinese brush painting class.

These guys and I admire the photos from Karen Bell's classes in nature photography at the Garden. In fact I'm scheming how I could take one of her classes myself.
For more information and a link to this show, see the article top left of this blog in the BYTE NOW
column.
And if you need another excuse to visit the garden now, the important bonsai collection in the same conservatory building offers this cherry in bloom among the specimens.

Click on any image to enlarge.