“Redouté to Warhol: Bunny Mellon’s Botanical Art” Opens at NYBG
By the time she passed away in 2014 at the age of 103, Rachel “Bunny” Mellon had collected many thousands of botanical art works, some 80 of which (including pieces never before seen) are now on display at the New York Botanical Garden. The exhibit– “Redouté to Warhol: Bunny Mellon’s Botanical Art”— is open until February 12th, 2017, and celebrates Mellon’s love of botanical art through a carefully-curated selection of engravings, water colors, and canvas works. The works encompass a range of artists, from Henri Rousseau to Pablo Picasso, but each have the spirit of nature at their core.
For Mellon, gardening was a lifelong passion that began when she was five years old, and included incredible garden design works like the Kennedy Rose Garden. Her own gardens at Oak Spring are a breathtaking display, so it’s of little surprise that her immense collection of art and 10,000 rare books are a similarly impressive ode to nature.
The exhibit is presented in partnership with the Oak Spring Garden Foundation, whose mission is to “perpetuate and share the gift of Rachel Lambert Mellon”. Like Mellon before them, the Oak Spring Garden Foundation’s work is “dedicated to facilitating scholarship and public engagement on the history and future of plants, including the culture of gardens and landscapes, and the importance of plants for human well-being”. If you’re looking to enjoy the beauty of nature from the comfort of indoors on a cool, Fall day, be sure to include the exhibit on your itinerary.
For more information on the Bunny Mellon Botanical Art Exhibit, check out the New York Botanical Garden’s website.
