· BOOK ·
The Tapestry of Life: A Botanical Artist’s Miscellany
Susan is delighted to have been invited to write a book for the Two Rivers Press as part of their series: Botanical Art Portfolios. The Tapestry of Life: A Botanical Artist’s Miscellany charts the course of her life-long inspiration from the plant world as well as providing insights into her processes and technique, lavishly illustrated by her work.
The book is available to buy now.
For more information from the publisher, please visit their website www.tworiverspress.com
(Cover image design courtesy of Two Rivers Press).
“The book is truly inspirational and highlights many of Susan’s beautiful artworks, the designs and patterns created with the flowers, fruits and leaves of plants are quite stunning. One can gaze at the artworks over and over again and still see something new, the detail Susan has captured with coloured pencils is amazing.
I personally enjoyed the accompanying text with snippets of useful information and clues to how the artworks were created. We are very proud to have two examples of Susan’s work in our Florilegium Archive, now safely stored at Sheffield City Archives.”
— Valerie Oxley, Chair of The Florilegium Society at Sheffield Botanical Gardens.
“This is another in Two Rivers Press’s selection of beautifully produced books on botanical subjects. These are not instruction manuals in the normal sense, but the authors will usually talk at least a bit about their working methods. Here, Susan goes into some detail about her use of equipment and ways of depicting flowers and foliage – there are even some step-by-step demonstrations.
This is by no means a book for the beginner, or even a complete course. Rather, it’s something for the more experienced botanical artist who is interested in developing their skills and studying the work of a consummate practitioner. I’ve often referred to “aspirational” books – those by artists the reader realises they’ll never match but who, if a fairy godmother were to wave a magic wand, paints the way they’d like to. This, I think, is something for the serious botanical artist to aim at.
As with its cousins, this is relatively small format, square to accommodate both tall and wide subjects, relatively short (88 pages) and not cheap. If you measure by width rather than quality, this will not be for you. If you want the best, though, it suddenly becomes rather magnificent value.”
— Henry Malt, www.artbookreview.wordpress.com