Botanical Art Worldwide 2025
Poland
Plants of Royal Kitchen Garden
from The Wilanów Palace Florilegium project
about
Museum of King Jan III's Palace in Wilanów would like to invite everybody to an exhibition of botanical illustrations created as part of the Wilanów Florilegium project - a collection of pictures and stories of plants from the Wilanów gardens. The exhibition showcases the diversity of useful plants, based on species from the museum's reconstruction garden and greenhouses, demonstrating the process of creation of scientific botanical illustration and techniques used in the process.
The Wilanów Florilegium - plants from the royal kitchen garden
The contemporary depictions of the local flora will be created during this year’s masterclasses. During the intensive art masterclass hosted by Izabela Wolska-Kuśmider, DipSBA(Dist), Member of The Society of Botanical Artists and American Society of Botanical Artists, https://www.greenart.pl/, the attendees will create works for the exhibition hosted as part of the international Botanical Art Worldwide 2025 celebrations. This spring, we are going to focus on the wealth of plants growing in a useful garden. The exhibition will focus on biodiversity and versatility of historic home gardens. During the masterclass, we will showcase the history of our reconstructed kitchen garden based on plants growing in the museum's historic garden. The participants will then carry out an in-depth study of the selected plants using a variety of artistic techniques (pencil, ink, silverpoint) and classic watercolour paint. Finally, they will choose a technque and create a work to be featured as part of the Wilanów Florilegium exhibition.
Above (Left to Right): sketchbook illustration by Izabela Wolska-Kusmider, study by Ewa Behrens-Nowakowska
Above: photos from the workshop
artwork
Above (Left to Right): Aronia melanocarpa, Black Chokeberry by Izabela Wolska-Kuśmider, watercolor on paper; Artichoke by Izabela Wolska-Kuśmider
exhibition Dates
May 18 - July 13, 2025
venue
Museum of King Jan III's Palace at Wilanów
The Wilanów residence is the best preserved Baroque royal palace in Poland, including an extensive park with various garden facilities, the Morysin nature reserve, and a lake. The Museum safeguards the resources of both culture and nature, striving for sustainable development and preservation for future generations of this unique place.
The Baroque Palace with its surrounding historic gardens, Park and Nature Reserve is a place where history is present in thick and intertwined layers. Today, the Palace and the historic Wilanów gardens are open to everyone – to experience, see, explore and enjoy the richness of flora and fauna.
In 2024, we started a unique project at the intersection of botany and art - Wilanów Florilegium. In a comprehensive way, during walks, meetings in the open reading room and workshops on contemporary botanical illustration, we explored the cultural history of plants on the example of flora specimens from Wilanów gardens.
More about our Museum: https://wilanow-palac.pl/en/
Tickets
Included with palace admission
events
Worldwide Day of Botanical Art
If you are interested in botanical art, join us on 18 May to celebrate the international festival of botanical illustration – Botanical Art Worldwide 2025. The day will be celebrated with numerous events and exhibitions around the world, showcasing contemporary botanical art. The Museum of King Jan III's Palace will showcase works created during the master classes hosted by Izabela Wolska-Kuśmider. The theme of this year’s Botanical Art Worldwide is crop diversity. In preparation for the exhibition, we took a closer look at the plants found in the museum's reconstruction garden and greenhouses. The selected plants were used in the 17th and 18th centuries as food, as well as for medicinal and ornamental purposes. Their depictions were created with various techniques used in botanical illustration, including pencil, ink, silverpoint and watercolour.
Additional Events
Colour in watercolour technique, Host: Izabela Wolska-Kuśmider, 18 May, 11:00 a.m. - 1:00 p.m.
An encounter with watercolour - an open opportunity to test the Roman Szmal colour palette, 18 May, 1:30 p.m. - 4:30 p.m.
Curator’s guided tour of the exhibition, Hosts: Ewa Behrens-Nowakowska, Izabela Wolska-Kuśmider, 18 May, 2:00 p.m. - 3:30 p.m.
steering committee
Ewa Behrens-Nowakowska (Curator)
Izabela Wolska-Kuśmider
Artists:
Izabela Wolska-Kuśmider, DipSBA(Dist), The Society of Botanical Artists and American Society of Botanical Artists.
Renata Domańska
Katarzyna Gajewska-Brodowska
Maria Mackiewicz
Agnieszka Malawska-Wasila
Izabela Maliszewska-Skiejka, The Society of Botanical Artists
Anna Mrozkowiak
Thai Linh Nguyen
Magdalena Pilarska, The Society of Botanical Artists
Magdalena Surawska
Ewa Winiarska
Iwona Woicka-Żuławska
Monika Wojkowska
Marianna Zych, Scottish Society of Botanical Artists
steering committee
Ewa Behrens-Nowakowska
Izabela Wolska-Kuśmider
organizer
Museum of King Jan III's Palace at Wilanów
more information about masterclasses: ebehrens@muzeum-wilanow.pl
EN https://wilanow-palac.pl/en/event/botanical-art-worldwide-2025-1
PL https://wilanow-palac.pl/wydarzenie/botanical-art-worldwide-2025
More about The Wilanów Palace Florilegium project:
PL https://wilanow-palac.pl/wspolczesna-ilustracja-botaniczna
more Informationabout the exhibition
https://wilanow-palac.pl/wystawa/botanical-art-worldwide-2025-wystawa-ilustracji-botanicznej
https://wilanow-palac.pl/en/exhibition/botanical-art-worldwide-2025-botanical-illustration-exhibition