may flower

April showers bring May flowers.

And although May has thirty-one days to produce the flowers, I’m impatient. I’d like them now. Maybe, some day, after I’ve lived in Winnipeg for a while longer, I’ll have the wisdom and the maturity and the patience to wait silently for those May flowers.

But while I wait for wisdom, maturity, patience, and – ahem – May flowers, I’ll make my own flowers thankyouverymuch. Here’s one that’s waiting to be mass produced.

The plate is for a print exchange I’m hosting. I had initially wanted to carve a bear coming out of hibernation but my designs for that plate truly sucked. I’m going to stick to eating bear, and I’ll leave drawing them to other people.

My idea for a bear plate came about because I thought that it would be fun and interesting to not produce a botanical image for this swap. Unfortunately, my list of design possibilities mainly featured plants. Oh well, I should accept the fact that I like plants. Very much. And that I find them fascinating. Endlessly so.

I found the inspiration for this particular snow drop in The Plant and Its Ornamental Applications (La plante et ses applications ornementales), which features all sorts of art nouveau yumminess and some great scientific drawings of plants. I had forgotten how much wonderful stuff is in New York Public Library’s Digital Collection. It’s pretty astounding and a great way to waste some serious time.

I’ll post pictures of the final print next week. It is kind of pretty.