The Temple of Flora by Robert John Thornton

Yesterday I went to the Botanic Garden. The Botanic Garden has always been a little refuge for me, a refuge from the city, when I’m feeling overwhelmed, when I want to daydream, it’s a nice little sanctuary. So yesterday after feeling all sorts of things the past few days I decided to take myself there. It was cold, and as expected there weren’t any flowers. I decided to go inside one of the main buildings and somehow wandered my way into the library. I think I was meant to stumble in there. When I walked in I noticed there were these beautiful prints along the perimeter. They very much reminded me of the world I am in when I make my work. After my poor attempt to document these, I decided to ask the librarian about them. She was super helpful, pulling out this large Taschen book. She told me the paintings were the first instance of flowers placed in a landscape for scientific illustration. The book, originally titled “New Illustration of the Sexual System” and later renamed “The Temple of Flora” was produced in 1807 and contains pages of these paintings. I spent a few hours studying the images until the library closed. I wanted to share some of the pictures I took that serve as inspiration for the new collection I am working on. Enjoy :)

Majority of the paintings shown here are by the painter Peter Charles Henderson (active 1791-1829)

If you’d like to take a look at the digital version of this book you can find it for free here :)