Japanese Knotweed. JKSL Annual Conference 2015
Beneath the extraordinary beauty of the Japanese Knotweed lies and almost indomitable spirit.
My latest presentation for JKSL at their annual conference, proved to be an exciting event particularly when I discovered ITV were there to film for a documentary on invasive species.
A Victorian themed conference called the ‘Root of all Evil’, was fascinating as an Illustrator to listen to presentations by some of the leading Scientists and experts in the country on invasive species. I was absolutely delighted when Mike Clough CEO of JKSL asked me to talk at the seminar about my Illustration they commissioned.
When I was initially commissioned to come up with a Victorian style Botanical Illustration, I wanted to really place myself in the shoes of Dr. Phillipe von Seibold. After a series of fascinating peregrinations the Victorian Dutchman, came upon Japanese Knotweed. A plant of monumental value, besides it’s agricultural and pastoral benefits, it also had medicinal and striking ornamental qualities. As if this wasn’t enough to entice a young plant collector on his expedition the Japanese made claims to this wonderful plant, being almost impossible to get rid of! Such a plant so newly imported from the East was bound to gain a high price.
Kew Gardens received one of the early distributions of Japanese Knotweed from Seibold in 1950, with the invitation of an exchange of further novelties. Collections of plants were frequently being traded to honourables, military and commercial nurseries apparently without distinction. The Japanese Knotweed quickly became a much desired exotic amongst wealthy Victorians, it wasn’t until some years later they were beginning to discover the true extent of it’s virulence.
In the year of Seibold’s death in 1866 his garden of acclimatisation at Leiden boasted almost a thousand different species and varieties of plants. By the the time the English horticulturists F.W. Burbidge and P. Barr visited (1883) less than 20 years later, they found a neglected jungle. Ironically overrun completely by Japanese Knotweed
Composition
I have a deep fascination with the Fibonacci sequence and a way devising composition in my artworks through what is called the Golden Section. The sequence is a Mathematical code dating back thousands of years, possibly more commonly known from the Illustrations Leonardo Da Vinci made in the early 1500’s. Fibonacci number sequences occur in most natural forms; plants, hurricane clouds, DNA, bone structure, and consequently in a manmade world, including architecture, stock market patterns, Chemistry, Music and Art.
So with the correlation between Art and Science this is divine partnership in which to begin composing my Artwork. Keeping true to historical reference of the Victorian style Botanical Drawing, I wanted to incorporate as much authenticity as possible. This is one of the reasons I chose to Illustrate the ‘Comma’ Butterfly as pollinating insects are often found on early Botanical paintings.
The Japanese Knotweed provides a valuable source of nectar for late summer butterflies. The ‘Comma’ was the only one I found to not only inhabit The UK and Europe, but bizarrely also Japan.
The starting point to my Illustration was to use the ratio from the fibonacci sequence to form firstly the correct proportions to divide my artwork and create a Golden section. This in the most simplistic of terms is dividing a whole rectangle into fifths and eights forming a series of squares and rectangles, which continue dividing within themselves. This method has been used throughout composition for centuries in art and is considered to be the secret behind many of the worlds most famous Masterpieces.
If you have you ever been curious of the extreme success of behind businesses and individuals Fibonacci sequences may be underlying. Within branding many use this key technique for their success . Mercedes, BP, Twitter, National Geographic, Apple these logo’s are all perfectly organised within a Golden section. Kate Moss has an extraordinarily photogenic face, although as a Super Model she wasn’t technically tall enough. If you put a Golden Section grid over a photo of her face, she is absolutely perfect. It is a peculiar replication of nature and mathematics which subconsciously draws us in to contemporary aesthetics.
Baring all of this in mind within the Golden Section, I created a Fibonacci Spiral. The end of the root to the tip of the top leaf on the Japanese Knotweed follow the lines of the spiral and continuing along with the brown stem of the plant in autumn. Inside the bottom division of the Golden Section I incorporated the Golden Pentagon which is an inner shape formed in the centre of a five pointed star (pentogram). The main leaf within the Illustration fits precisely within the Pentagon space , and other parts of my illustration fit directly onto points of the invisible lines that lie beneath.