ARTIST SPOTLIGHT: BOBBI ANGELL

J. Stephen Boatwright (University of the Western Cape, South Africa)

Bobbi Angell grew up in New York, and discovered a love for botanical illustration in college. She graduated in Botany at the University of Vermont in 1977, thereafter starting a career illustrating plants for scientists at the New York Botanical Gardens (NYBG) and other institutions around the world. She lives in southern Vermont, and pursues a love for gardening along with illustrating native and tropical plants.

During her career, Bobbi has focussed on illustrating plants for scholarly texts, aimed at clarifying the identification and description of plants. Her illustrations are based on herbarium material, pickled flowers, photographs or drawn in the field. Her illustrations are exceptionally detailed, and often include magnified details of the plants. She has amassed an immense portfolio, having completed thousands of illustrations for various publications and geographical regions. Many of her illustrations are published in monographs and articles of new species, and have more recently focused on Anacardiaceae, Melastomataceae, Myrtaceae and Myristicaceae. She has worked on several floras, including Flowering Plants of the Neotropics, Guide to the Vascular Plants of Central French Guiana (2 volumes), Orchid Flora of the Greater Antilles, Vines and Climbing Plants of Puerto Rico and Intermountain Flora (9 volumes). Some of her most well-known work on legumes were the illustrations she made for Rupert Barneby, including the Fabales volume of the Intermountain Flora and many new species in Silk Tree, Guanacaste, Monkey’s Earring (2 volumes 1996, 1997) and Sensitivae Censitae Mimosa (1991).

Her interests also span other projects, including adding artwork to garden memoirs and working on her copper etchings. Two co-authored books have been published recently – A Botanist’s Vocabulary and Darwin and the Art of Botany.

Further information can be found on her website (https://www.bobbiangell.com/)

Swartzia arenophila R. B. Pinto, Torke & Mansano and S. thomasii R. B. Pinto, Torke & Mansano, published in Brittonia 64: 119–138, 2012.

Senna chrysocarpa (Desv.) H.S.Irwin and Barneby from Guide to the Vascular Plants of Central French Guiana.