Botanical Art

Before cameras, there was botanical art. Early herbals were noted for their woodcuts. Later etchings and lithographs created more detailed prints. At their best botanical representations often were better for identification than photos. The artist had the control to make sure key characters were displayed. We may look at some of the early woodcuts and wonder how people identified plants based upon the stylized representations but when botanical art reached its prime plants were depicted extremely accurately. This was no small task since artists were often presented with flowers that were about to wilt or worse had been pressed between sheets of paper. But for the most part the images they created would make it easy to identify the plant.

For more information on historic Irises visit the Historic Iris Preservation Society at

-- BobPries - 2014-11-26