Botanical illustrations are a very effective way of passing on information about plants (HUDLER 2009).

In Vienna, skillfully laid-out plant portraits play an important role in scientific publications and florilegia since the 18th century (LACK 2001). This can, e.g., be prominently seen in the works of NIKOLAUS JOSEPH VON JACQUIN, the famous botanist and director of the Botanical Garden (HBV) of the University of Vienna (LACK 2001, KIEHN 2007). JACQUIN specifically trained and selected plant illustrators to work for him. Thus, one of his masterpieces, the “Florae Austriacae sive, plantarum selectarum in Austriae archi-ducatu sponte crescentium: icones, ad vivum coloratae, et descriptionibus, ac synonymis illustratae”(*), contains 500 plates with coloured copper engravings of plant por-traits. They are mostly done by the artist FRANZ SCHEIDL (LACK 2001) and illustrate JACQUIN’S latin descriptions of species native to the surroundings of Vienna. For “Icones plantarum rariorum“ (**), done from 1781 to 1795, the famous brothers FRANZ and FERDINAND BAUER were in the team of illustrators (MABBERLEY 1999). There are styli-stic differences compared to “Florae austriacae…“ in that de-tails, which only could be distinguished using a microscope, are depicted and the arrangement of the plant in the page is much more elaborate.

Numerous plants shown and described in these works are typical elements of the “steppe-vegetation” of the xerother-mic regions southeast of Vienna, the so called “Pannonian” flora. Preserving rare species of this floristic region is a cen-tral aspect of the Botanical Garden of the University of Vienna (HBV) today (STAMPF et al. 1999, KIEHN & SCHUMACHER 2001).

While the botanical illustration remained an important tool in descriptive botany, the tradition of training artists in the spe-cial skills needed for high quality plant portraits faded away in Vienna. In recent years however, plant illustration activities are booming again worldwide (SHERWOOD 2005). Consequently, the Austrian Zoological-Botanical Society (ZOOBOT) started to organize training courses in cooperation with the Botanical Garden of the University of Vienna (HBV).

Dr. Michael Kiehn, the director of the HBV, has been sup-porting this initiative for the last 5 years.The introductory courses are guided by the botanical artist Margareta Pertl, who has been painting plants from the collections of the bota-nical gardens in Vienna and Dublin. For her illustrations she has been awarded three times by the Royal Horticultural Society, London, and one of her orchid portraits has been ex-hibited at the 13th International Exhibition of Botanical Art & Illustration in the Hunt Institute for Botanical Documentation, Pittsburgh, PA, an institution dedicated to collecting high qua-lity contemporary plant portraits (CATALOGUE 2010).

In order to link these courses to the Viennese tradition of bo-tanical illustration as an art form connected to science, only plants from the HBV are used as motives; this way a new “students’ florilegium“ of the HBV’s collections is going to be developed over the years with a main focus on plants from the Pannonian region. In addition to the artistic aspect, these illustrations are contributing to the scientific and educational work done at the HBV: in autumn and winter, copies of the il-lustrations are exhibited in the garden to create curiosity and to offer an opportunity to perceive plants from a different point-of-view. The plant portraits will also be used to supple-ment texts for a planned guidebook related to the conservati-on efforts at the HBV.

Botanical illustration in Vienna once and now -exemplified on plants from the Pannonian region

byMichael Kiehn, Petra Hudler, Margareta Pertl

Literature:

CATALOGUE, 2010: 13th International Exhibition of Botanical Art & Illustration. – Pittsburgh: Hunt Institu-te for Botanical Documentation.

HUDLER, PETRA, 2009: Botanische Illustration – die Kunst über Jahrhunderte im Dienst der Wissen-schaft? (Botanical illustration – art serving science over centuries?). Sauteria 18, 187-208

*JACQUIN, NIKOLAUS JOSEPH VON, 1773 -1778: Florae Austriacae, sive plantarum selectarum in Austriae archiductu: sponte crescentium icones, ad vivum coloratae, et descriptionibus, ac synonymis illustratae / opera et sumptibus. (5 vols., 500 plates). – Wien: Kaliwoda.

**JACQUIN, NIKOLAUS JOSEPH VON, 1781 -1793: Icones plantarum rariorum. (3 vols., 648 col. plates (some folded), mainly by Joseph Hofbauer, Ferdinand and Franz Bauer, and Joseph Scharf). – Wien: C.F. Wappler.

KIEHN, MICHAEL, SCHUMACHER, FRANK, 2001: Experienta Gradinii Botanice a Universitatii din Viena in implementarea Conventiei asupra Conservarii Biodiversitatii -

Conservation of biodiversity, the convention on biodiversity (CBD) and botanic gardens - examples from the Botanical Garden of the University of Vienna (HBV). – in: SARBU, ANCA (Ed.): Diversitatea plantelor in contextul strategiei Europene de conservare a biodiversitatii: sinteze. 127-136. –- Bucuresti: Edit. alo, Bu-curesti!.

KIEHN, MICHAEL, 2007: Der Botanische Garten der Universität Wien – Forschungsstätte mit Tradition und innerstädtische Oase. – Museum Aktuell Mai 2007, 36-39.

LACK, HANS WALTER, 2001: Ein Garten Eden. – Köln: Taschen.

MABBERLEY, DAVID, 1999: The nature of discovery. – London: Merrell Holberton Pub. Ltd.

SHERWOOD, SHIRLEY, 2005: A new flowering: 1000 years of botanical art. – Oxford: Ashmolean Museum.

STAMPF, JOHANN, SCHUMACHER, FRANK, KIEHN, MICHAEL, 1999: Eine "Gstätten" auf historischem Grund? Die Pannonische Gruppe im Botanischen Garten der Universität Wien. – Zolltexte 32, 26-34.

Contact:

Dr. Michael Kiehn, Core Facility Botanical Garden, Faculty of Life Sciences, University of Vienna, Rennweg 14, 1030 Vienna, AUSTRIA michael.kiehn@univie.ac.at

Dr. Petra Hudler, Zoologisch-Botanische Gesellschaft (Austrian Zoological-Botanical Society), PF 45, 1091 Vienna, AUSTRIA petra.hudler@univie.ac.at

Mag. Margareta Pertl, Dublin, IRELAND PM_bot_art@hotmail.com

Reproductions of the illustrations from JACQUIN’s publications were kindly permitted by the Vienna University Library.

Design: Angelika Hudler Photos: Dr. Alexander Seidel

See historical and contemporary botanical illustrations at one glance: compare plant portraits of the same species from the 18th century from JACQUIN’S folios with the new “students’ florilegium“ done in the HBV in Vienna in 2010.

Heidemarie GrillitschNikolaus J. von Jacquin * T. 377Prunella grandiflora

Nikolaus J. von Jacquin * T. 418 Claudia KeindlLinum austriacum

Nikolaus J. von Jacquin * T. 311Lavatera thuringiaca

Monika Kiehn

Nikolaus J. von Jacquin ** T. 112 Margareta PertlDracocephalum austriacum

Mischa SkoreczNikolaus J. von Jacquin * T. 428Dictamnus albus

Nikolaus J. von Jacquin * T. 5 Gabriela SchubertIris variegata