Friday, April 22, 2011

Botanic Illustration Exhibit

April 26 through —EXTENDED through July 7 or so..., 2011
Botanic Illustration by Molly Coxson Gill
Curated by Greg Coxson
Space 7:10 at Kefa Cafe
963 Bonifant St. in downtown Silver Spring, Maryland

Molly grew up in Alexandria, Virginia, and in her youth also lived in Sudan, Romania, the Czech Republic and New Zealand. She graduated from The College of William and Mary in 1983 with a BA in Anthropology and minor in Art History, and from George Washington University in 1989, with an MA in Museum Studies and Anthropology. Molly worked ten years in the Departments of the Director and Anthropology at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History. She has also had various jobs in education, including teaching art. Molly moved with her family (husband, Tony, and children, Nathaniel and Kelly) to Tempe, Arizona, in 2003, after ten years in London. Molly's love of desert plants and art led her to enroll in the Phoenix Desert Botanical Gardens Art and Illustration Program in 2004. She received her botanical illustration certification in November, 2010. Molly worked in the DBG herbarium under the direction of botanist, Wendy Hodgson, from 2008 to March of this year. Illustrations projects include: the Grand Canyon Rare and Sensitive Plants Project, Arizona Sclerocacti for the final volume of Intermountain Flora for the New York Botanical Gardens, and two Grand Canyon Mentzelia species new to science and published, or to be published, in Brittonia. Molly moved with her family to Sydney, Australia, in March. She looks forward to illustrating the flora of Australia and plans to seek opportunities teaching botanical illustration.