Anne Blackwell Thompson: Botanical Artist

Artist Anne Blackwell Thompson’s artwork is very different from what other botanical artists do. Her work involves a lot of planning and requires a great deal of knowledge about the plants she’s capturing.

“When people ask me what I do and I describe myself as a botanical artist, I think they immediately think I am painting…but my art medium is the actual plant material.” 

By foraging herself, she gets to have that intimate connection with the plant, flower, or even seaweed she uses. She’s touching the material and getting to know all the intricacies of it. What makes her work unique is that when she’s searching for material, she’s not looking for the best.

“I like plants that have a little bit of personality to them and some unique characteristics. When I’m out harvesting, I’m not looking for perfection. I don’t feel like nature is perfect.”

Harvesting the plant material is just one step in a very involved process. Those plants need to immediately be put into a press for them to dry properly, the result of those dried plants is what requires an understanding of the specimen she’s putting together and the patience to do it right.

“When you open up the plant press, it almost looks like a jigsaw puzzle, you might have 200 pieces that I’ve completely dissected and once I open that press after they’ve completely dried, I need to reconstruct that plant.”

Anne’s hope for people viewing her work is that they would experience whatever place she’s captured with the pressed material and that they are inspired to do their own exploration of these spaces. 

“I hope people experience a love of nature, an awe of nature, I hope they take some of the educational components and it makes them want to explore…”

For more information, visit Anne’s website. Follow her on Instagram.

The Director of Photography for this episode is Kevin Gillingham.

Directed by Stephen Farris.

Editing by Stephen Farris & Kevin Gillingham.

Produced by Laura Christian.