Wallflower and Tulip

Maker Matilda Conyers (British, 1698-1793)

Collections

Women Artists

ClassificationsDRAWINGS

Date1767

Mediumwatercolor and opaque watercolor over traces of graphite with brown ink (est. iron gall) inscriptions on vellum

Dimensions9 x 6 1/4 in. (22.9 x 15.9 cm.)

DescriptionThis watercolor shows a wallflower and tulip in bright colors.

InscribedInscription signed and dated at lower right: M Conyers May 1767; titled at lower left: Wallflower and Tulip

Credit LineThe Huntington Library, Art Museum, and Botanical Gardens

Status

Not on view

Label TextFlower painting was considered an appropriate pastime for aristocratic women in the eighteenth century. Members of the Conyers family, which included a number of women who were accomplished botanical artists, may have taken lessons from Georg Ehret, whose work is on view nearby. This drawing reveals an understanding of the Linnaean system of classification, showing all parts of the flower to aid in identification. Conyers records the wallflower with open petals and in bud form. Her skill in describing plants is revealed in the delicate rendering of the tulip’s variegated petals, one of which curls upward slightly as it falls away from the rest of the flower.

Object number97.22.5