“The Botanist’s Mural”
2024
Acrylic, graphite, and varnish on gypsum board
Collection of Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, NY
“The Botanist’s Mural” draws inspiration from Vassar College's herbarium, which dates back to the school's founding in 1865. I incorporated 63 plants from the extensive collection of 15,000 specimens, including vascular plants, bryophytes, and algae housed in the Herbarium. I painted each plan to simultaneously resemble a hybrid of the pressed specimen and what the plan would have looked like while still growing in nature. All the painted flora has the illusion of specimen mounting adhesive strips as well as shadows to make them appear to be three-dimensional and taped directly to the wall. One of the artworks I admire whenever I visit The Loeb Museum is “The Botanist," painted by Alfred Ronner in 1875, which Vassar acquired a few years later in 1880 when it was still considered contemporary. I displayed a print of this piece in my studio while I worked on studies for my painting and pressed plants, as well as during my work on the mural. One of the most challenging aspects of the creation process was narrowing down my choices, knowing I could only include a limited selection. Each featured plant is based on one or more pressed specimens. For instance, since there were numerous varieties of Columbines cataloged, I chose several to include in the painting, including one from 1865. My selections aimed to showcase a diverse array of wild and cultivated plants found both locally and globally, highlighting how the collection at Vassar has grown over the years. A few of the plants depicted are ones I pressed myself so I could also be “The Botanist,” and I selected a specimen from the landscaping right outside this building to represent a plant from the summer of 2024, when the building and the mural were completed. I incorporated some of my favorite plants that had an impact on my early love of plants including the Lady Slipper Orchid, Poppies, and an abundance of ferns. Additionally, I subtly referenced Matthew Vassar’s background as a brewery owner by including a hops plant that I preserved from the Shaker Heritage Society garden, creating a connection between the mural and my “Planting Utopia” series and the herbarium of 150 medicinal plants I created as part of that project.
Many thanks to Mark Schlessman, Professor of Biology Emeritus who collected thousands of specimens in the herbarium over his decades at Vassar and who was a constant wealth of knowledge about all things herbarium, even after retirement. Thank you Mary-Kay Lombino, Deputy Director and Curator at The Loeb for bringing me on board with the project back in the early days of days of envisioning the building and providing feedback during the process. Special thanks to Bella Rose Wild and Carly Andrews for assisting in the hundreds of hours of executing this mural and Sean Hemmerle Photography for documenting the process and final mural.