Rory McEwen: A New Perspective on Nature

Rory McEwen: A New Perspective on Nature

I paint flowers as a way of getting as close as possible to what I perceive as the truth, my truth of the time in which I live.

–Rory McEwen

The exquisite botanical art work of Rory McEwen will begin a tour at the charming Gibbes Museum of Art in Charleston, South Carolina Jan. 26. And, the connection to our area of Virginia, you ask? The exhibit will feature McEwen’s work, some of which Bunny Mellon loaned to the Kennedy White House but also a range of superb historical material from the Oak Spring Library in Upperville.

From the Gibbes Museum: Presenting the vibrant and varied career of the renowned Scottish artist, Rory McEwen (1932 –1982), this exhibition reveals McEwen’s lifelong enquiry into light and color through his remarkable paintings of plants.  Bringing a modern sensibility to botanical art, McEwen developed a distinctive style, painting on vellum and using large empty backgrounds on which his plant portraits seem to float. Without shadows and executed in exact, minutely accurate detail, he recorded the imperfect and the unique, as well as the flawless. McEwen’s work, shown in this exhibition alongside the works of master botanical artists from the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries, “has had a lasting impact on the botanical art world, where he is recognized as one of the standard-bearers of today’s renaissance in botanical painting.”

The first stop on this tour, Rory McEwen: A New Perspective on Nature, at the Gibbes Museum of Art will run from Jan. 26 to April 28. The tour will run into 2025 and is sponsored by the Gerald B. Lambert Foundation, Oak Spring Garden Foundation and Royal Botanic Gardens Kew.

Details: https://www.ustour.rorymcewen.com/

PURPLE AND WHITE TULIP ‘COLUMBINE’, 1974, by Rory McEwen (Scottish, 1932 – 1982). Watercolor on vellum, 15.87 × 11.5 inches. On loan courtesy of Rory McEwen Ltd.

©The Estate of Rory McEwen

The book Rory McEwen: A New Perspective on Nature has been edited by Sir Peter Crane, FRS, president of the Oak Spring Garden Foundation in Upperville. It has been published in concert with the touring exhibit. Rachel “Bunny” Lambert Mellon deemed McEwen “the preeminent botanical artist of the twentieth century.”

To order copies of the book go to: https://bit.ly/rory-mcewen-book.

Red Pepper, 1971, by Rory McEwen (Scottish, 1932 – 1982). Watercolor on vellum, 11.38 × 15.5 inches. On loan courtesy of Lord and Lady Hesketh.

©The Estate of Rory McEwen