Here we are again with another instalment in the Art + Design Store – Friday Feature column, where I look more closely at one of the artworks in my Art + Design Store…
Today it’s the limited edition giclée print Cabbage Palm, which featured in my recent solo exhibition: Collected Patterns: The botany of Walter Hill. Part of a series of six giclée prints, printed on 100% cotton rag Hahnemühle fine art paper using long-life pigment inks, this white on black work was inspired by the dedicated research of Walter Hill, the Brisbane Botanic Gardens’ first and most significant curator (1855-1881).
The Cabbage Palm is found in moist open forest, often in swampy sites and on margins of rainforests or near the sea. It is widely spread along the New South Wales coast and extends north into Queensland and southwards to eastern Victoria.
Walter Hill wrote in his 1870 Annual Report on the Brisbane Botanic Garden, “Encouraged by the great success of the growth of the Palms and the Cycads, made in the compartment of ground set apart for me near the Aviary, and the great interest taken in them, a new plantation has been formed adjacent to the residence of the Director, and many of these graceful and highly useful trees have already attained to dimensions of considerable importance…” Hill was a big fan of the palm tree and continued to research both native and foreign varieties.
This design is both organic and asymmetrical, yet it achieves balance and symmetry in its composition. I wanted to create volume in the work without it being overtly three-dimensional and I wanted the design to dance on the page, just as the fruit on the tree dances in the wind.
Hope you enjoy the work, it’s facts and history as much as I did researching and making it. The prints are part of an edition of 10 and there are still some available in the Store.
There are lots more facts and artwork details to come in this column, so keep following on Fridays for the next artwork featured in the Art + Design Store!
