This week we’re delighted to be welcoming Botanical Artist Sally Pond to our Arty Afternoon atelier, with her video studying a stunning Helenium.
To watch and be inspired, please click on the ‘Play’ button below
Despite not being filmed specifically for our creative series, the video exhibits Sally’s careful painting process, which we think you’ll find is a source of immense inspiration.
The video illustrates the way in which her delicate paintings are intricately created using small and specific brush strokes, a thoughtful technique which results in something truly beautiful. Her words of wisdom introduce all of us to the world of Botanical Painting and how this artistic form is a wonderful way to capture and simply encourage everyone to engage with the more exquisite elements of our surrounding flora.
As Sally shares, the key to Botanical Painting is simply being patient and paying extraordinary attention to detail. Once you’ve mastered the two, it won’t be long until you’re calmly and comfortably whiling away many hours absorbed in the beauty of the natural world.
The pleasure to be found in art is something Sally has been enjoying since school, but it wasn’t until 2009 that she enrolled in a Botanical Painting diploma course run by the English Gardening School at the Chelsea Physic Garden in London. She graduated with distinction in 2011 and in the same year moved to Salisbury, quickly settling into the thriving local art scene.
Since then, she has become a member of the Society of Botanical Artists (SBA) the South West Society of Botanical Artists (SWSBA) Amicus Botanicus, the American Society of Botanical Artists (ASABS) the Salisbury Group of Artists and Plain Arts Salisbury.
Sally’s passion and talent for Botanical Art has led to her exhibiting regularly. She has appeared on three occasions at the RHS Botanical Art Exhibition, where she achieved three silver-gilt medals. Consequently, she’s now an established Botanical Art Teacher, running regular workshops at Sarum College in Salisbury’s Cathedral Close and for Artsmart, an independent art school in Beaconsfield.
In more recent years, Sally has also spent much of her time with the Salisbury Florilegium Society, which she established in 2016. The Society brought together a group of her students and a collective of other local artists, who all shared the intention of painting plants and flowers to be found in the gardens of Salisbury’s Cathedral Close. The group now exhibit annually as part of the Friends of Salisbury Cathedral’s Open Garden Trail.
We are so grateful to Sally for sharing her video with us and will look forward to hearing more about the spring and summer blooms you choose to approach with newfound appreciation throughout the coming months.
