Drawing and Painting Botanicals for Artists: How to Create Beautifully Detailed Plant and Flower Illustrations

Drawing and Painting Botanicals for Artists is a tutorial and style guide for rendering botanical subjects in a variety of media. Due out 16th June 2020 from Quarto on their Rockport imprint, it's 144 pages and will be available in paperback format.

This is a nicely designed and well presented book. It is aimed at artists who are engaged in, or studying botanical art subjects and still life drawing. The introduction provides an overview of tools and supplies, preparing botanical materials and how to visualize and see as an artist.  The main tutorials are split into two sections for different media: drawing and rendering with pencils and other drawing tools (including colored pencils), and painting with watercolor (and gouache). 

Although it's a simple book which allows the learner to utilize widely available materials for skill building, it contains a lot of valuable information, and I could well see this book being used to advantage in a classroom setting. It is aimed at intermediate to advanced artists but there are definitely takeaways for beginners as well. There are some tutorials showing how to break down references in perspective and transfer them realistically to the page.

A very useful book. It would make a good addition to the artist's home reference library, a classroom or other formal setting, or gift (with supplies) for an artist.

Four stars.

Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher for review purposes.