Hillary Parker’s painting career started with a mistake.
“Serendipity has always directed the way for me,” she said.
She enrolled in college to become an elementary school art teacher. In her senior year, a schedule mix-up landed her in an advanced painting course instead of the introductory one. She was granted access to the class on the condition she could handle the work and their weekly critiques.
For her first project, she chose an artichoke, potato, a head of garlic, and green onions from her own refrigerator and painted individual studies of each of them. Then the big day came.
“True to his word, the professor started going down the row of student artwork, harshly critiquing them,” Parker said. “When he got to mine, he paused, turned and smiled at me, looked back at my little veggies, and pointed to the artichoke. He said, ‘I want to eat that for dinner.’”
See Life More Leisurely Through Botanical Illustration Study
Rose Marie James is an instructor in the Garden’s Botanical Art and Illustration program.
What started me thinking about what I call “slow art” is my affinity for “slow food” (I must confess to a McDonald’s fix on occasion). Engaging in the preparation of food is a more meaningful experience for me than driving through a pick-up window or popping something into the microwave.
Knowing what a bean looks like before it gets cut up, handling a whole head of lettuce that needs washing and tearing into bite-size pieces, trimming the greens and roots from a beet before cooking remind me that I am connected to and rely on plants to thrive. Additionally, eating food that is carefully prepared is both satisfying and delicious.
That same kind of connection between process and result is the reason I love working as a botanical artist, and have, therefore, come to see it as “slow art.”
It contrasts with the work I have done as a graphic designer in promotional advertising, where everything has to be done in a hurry. Using the computer to this purpose just amplifies the frenzy, leaving time for little but making things look good.
