Dream Big
There’s a big dream in all of us. We all have that one big goal that we dream of achieving, but sometimes it can be really difficult to see how we can make it real. I still have those big dreams, even though a couple have come true. It’s the chase that excites us. We just have to keep chasing.
Takeaway Tips
Make a list of achievable goals. (Winning the lottery isn’t really manageable, so leave that one out!). Think of one or two things that you would like to work towards. Goals to achieve in a year might be to get accepted into a good exhibition, or to get an article published in a journal. Or both!
Think about the path to achieving each goal. This might be a series of smaller steps. The steps will become the goals. For example. If your dream is to get a RHS medal, the smaller steps might first be to have a good backup of juried exhibitions, and then get through the entry process for the RHS. These were my first step, and it gives you the experience of what is required.
With each entry, up your game.
Challenge your practice.
Up your game. With each exhibition entry push your practice further. Paint with purpose and intention. Enter the more important international exhibitions such as the International Exhibitions held at the Hunt Institute for Botanical Documentation, the Society of Botanical Artists ‘Plantae’ exhibition or the ASBA Annual International Botanical Art Exhibition.
Smaller Steps to Achieve Big.
As you have read in this series of posts, the road to Gold didn’t come easy, or overnight. Each smaller step guided the line of travel. Like going up stairs, each step will take us higher and nearer to the top. If we take a misstep, we go backwards, and start to climb again. This is often a hidden process. We don’t see the stumbles and challenges that others make. All we often see from the outside is the finished, perfect product. The small steps are just as important.
How it Ended
As we come to end of the story I feel it’s only right with this post that we actually start backwards, with the result. It’s the bit everyone waits for on the day, but the RHS medal awards are only the icing on the cake. The tip of the iceberg is another way to look at it. Up to that point, there is a whole different story that has been going on.
In this case, it ended with a Gold medal, but it could have been a different result and I would have picked myself up, taken on board the feedback and had another go.
As Yoda says, “do or do not, there is no try”
How it Started - 2023
Now let’s pick it up where we left off in 2023 with the publication of my book ‘Vibrant Botanical Painting’.
The book ‘Vibrant Botanical Painting…’ was published in September 2023, but I’d actually finished work on it back in 2022. My part in the process was over at that point, and I was free again to begin planning my next project. This didn’t need much thinking about as I had already been beginning to think about my next RHS series.
I always paint the things that I love, the plants that are woven into my own story. These are the plants that I have grown up with, and now have the opportunity to grow in my own garden. The ties that bind us to childhood memories are strong and many of the plants I look out onto now are reflected in my parents garden. Cuttings and bulbs have been gifted from them over the years, and now that they have have decided to move on and leave their house of over 50 years, it’s poignant to think that my own garden will be all that will be left as a physical reminder of a house and a home. From all of this, how did I pick a series, and why was it something new?
For the series in 2021 I had chosen echinacea. These were stubborn blighters to grow in my garden and they promptly all died after I’d finished painting them. I wasn’t going to make that mistake again. I like gardening but I’m not a gardener. I like to grow plants which feel like old friends, who just get on with their own business with little interference. These had been a challenge in more ways than one.
I had learnt many lessons from the echinacea series, and not just from the feedback. The thing that had attracted me to them in first place had been their statuesque presence and form. They spoke of a sense of grandeur, making a commanding statement of strength, but with an underlying fragility. As it was, they were too fragile to survive my garden. As the paintings headed off to new homes, their story was complete.
Tulips
When a subject speaks to you, don’t ignore it. I knew I wanted to paint something with presence. Something that would make a statement. Something I could grow. Something that would love me back!
Early into the process, I spotted an Instagram post by the incredible Polly Nicholson @bayntunflowers featuring a somewhat unusual tulip with raspberry ripple petals, and a tall willowy habit. This would turn out to be Tulipa clusiana ‘Peppermintstick’. Something about the colour, the elegance and the presence of this flower reached out to me. I knew nothing about species tulips, and found out that these were the original ‘botanical class’ varieties from which all other tulips that we know today have been bred from.
These tulips grow wild in the mountain regions of eastern Europe. Smaller in size to hybrid tulips, the delicate appearance of these flowers hide their strength as they are extremely hardy, and survive vicious winters to grow year after year. Their story felt like my own story, and I really wanted to put the spotlight on them. Little did I know that the narrative of success over adversity would become quite so entwined with this series of works.
Grow, grow, grow
Planting a bulb and watching it grow is one of the most satisfying things to do. I have loved gardening since I was proudly awarded my gardening badge as a Brownie. Small children love getting their hands in the ground, and as my parents still remind me today, I was always getting muddy. That said, I wouldn’t call myself a ‘proper gardener’, more of a, ‘try it and it might grow if we’re lucky’ dabbler. The prospect of putting bulbs in the ground for more than just a pretty garden display was pretty scary. I planted loads more than I needed. Just in case.
If you have read my earlier post (click below), you will know that the ‘Tulipa 2025’ story didn’t quite go as smoothly as it could have done. In the spring of 2024 disaster struck with a flood which wiped out much of our home and belongings. This resulted in near total failure of being able to paint at all due to not having any furniture, kitchen, or heating during the coldest months of the year!
https://jarniegodwin.substack.com/p/behind-the-scenes-and-private-views
Amongst all this chaos, the bulbs were happily growing, and it felt like they were almost urging me to get on with it. During a walk in the garden to talk things over, my husband pointed out a small bud emerging on Tulipa humilis ‘Persian Pearl’. Quietly, he said, ‘look, there’s a promise a pearls’. From that moment on I knew the series of tulips would became a story of chaos, and not giving up, but they would be painted. (In early 2025 we finally got everything back to near normal, and the paintings were nearly finished). And so we go back to where we started, with the medal result.
Paint!
Over this series I have shared everything that led up to this point. Starting out as a complete beginner, I was never going to be an overnight success. Graft, intention, perseverance, commitment and practice have been the driving force of my work. I never started out wanting an RHS Gold Medal, I just wanted to paint and maybe get my work into an exhibition. I still get the ‘no’. I still get days when I feel I can’t paint. We all do. But I hope the last few posts have given you an insight into what it takes, how long it takes, and what happens along the way when you set out on your path.
The RHS Gold came 2 years after the book was published, 4 years after the RHS Silver-Gilt, 7 years after Waterlily went to the Hunt Institute for Botanical Documentation, and 10 years after ‘Bramble’ was refused by the Hunt in 2015. It’s also been 16 years since I first started botanical painting from a complete beginner. The dream jar is full of new dreams and goals
Tulipa 2025
Tulipa: Species and Botanical Class Tulips
Next time. What comes next?…
Let’s Paint
J x
I loved reading this series-thank you!