Losing Paradise? to Open at Kew

Shirley Sherwood Gallery
of Botanical Art
Photo courtesy
 of RBG Kew

After its debut at the Missouri Botanical Garden in October of 2009 and its subsequent tour around the United States in 2010, Losing Paradise? opens at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, UK on Saturday June 25th, 2011 as part of a broader exhibition Plants in Peril at the Shirley Sherwood Gallery of Botanical Art.  The exhibit runs thru Sunday, October 16th.  All 44 paintings from the Losing Paradise? travelling exhibition will be on display portraying threatened and endangered plants from North & South America, Europe, Africa, Asia, and Australia.

Also running this summer (thru July 31st) at The New York Botanical Garden is the ASBA curated Green Currency, Plants in the Economy exhibition of botanical art.  For more information visit http://www.asbagreencurrency.blogspot.com/.

Losing Paradise? in Your Classroom

The latest issue of Smithsonian in Your Classroom produced by the Smithsonian Center for Education and Museum Studies and distributed to school districts across the country is titled Botany & Art and their role in conservation and is based on ASBA's Losing Paradise? exhibition.

The magazine provides lesson plans that introduce students to plant conservation and take them through the process of creating their own botanical illustration. Students compare herbarium specimens, photographs, and artwork of six endangered plants all from Losing Paradise? Endangered Plants Here & Around the World.

Materials may be reproduced by teachers for use in the classroom and are available for download at http://www.smithsonianeducation.org/educators/lesson_plans/botany/