The blue gentian, painted by Marie in both albums in this exhibition, is one of His Majesty’s favourite Romanian flowers. Here Marie depicts the marsh gentian, a native of damp meadows. Mary Ellen Taylor’s beautiful illustration of a fringed gentian celebrates one of the most striking of Romania’s wildflowers, a plant of pastures that is almost the last to flower in autumn.
Although often dealing with similar species, the artists of the Transylvania Florilegium approach their subject in a very different way to Marie’s highly personal flower paintings. Christine’s Battle precise botanical illustration of a globeflower is shaped by the highest standards of scientific accuracy that allow one plant to be recognised and distinguished from another.
The Iris was a favourite flower of Art Nouveau artists. Marie featured it frequently in her paintings and furniture designs and grew it in large quantities in her gardens. Jenny Phillips illustrates the pigmy iris, a plant of Central and East Asia that reaches Europe only in Romania.